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THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

THE RESURRECTED
NATIONS

SHORT HISTORIES OF THE PEOPLES FREED BY

THE GREAT WAR AND STATEMENTS OF

THEIR NATIONAL CLAIMS

BY

ISAAC DON LEVINE

Author of "The Russian Revolution"
WITH MAPS

NEW YORK

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY

PUBLISHERS

^V

A

Copyright, 1919, hy
Frederick A. Stokes Compant

AU rights reserved, including that of translaiion
into foreign languages

MAR 31 1919

©Cf.A512859

PEEFACE

The collapse of the Eussian, Turkish, Austro-
Hungarian and German empires set free a large
number of oppressed nationalities. This book
aims to present, from a strictly impartial view-
point, the cases of those of the liberated races and
peoples of the fallen four empires which have
awakened to the call of nationalism and now de-
mand the early attention of the world's public
opinion. Each of the eighteen chapters of the
book deals with a particular national problem.

The purpose of the writer has been to give to
the average reader an unbiased, clear, authorita-
tive summary of the history and present status of
the nationalities discussed. Is it necessary to re-
fer to the patent fact that both the United States
and Europe are flooded by an actual torrent of
conflicting, confusing, misleading statements by
the advocates of the antagonistic nationalities
clamoring for the public's support? To recite to
the bewildered reader the sober truth, while sym-
pathetic toward the cause of oppressed national-
ism, is what I endeavored to do in these pages.

In order to avoid misunderstanding, I wish to
state here that this book is entirely new and does

vi PEEFACEJ

not contain any of the seven articles on the new
nations which I wrote for The New York Tribune
in 1917. Also, this work is not a discussion of
the problem of nationality and is not an effort on
the part of the author to solve the various national
questions. It is not a controversial treatise, but
a popular history. If the information it contains
will contribute to the clarification in the public's
mind of the fundamental facts regarding the
emancipated nationalities of Europe and the Near
East, its object will have been attained.

Isaac Don Levine

New York Qty
March, 1919

CONTENTS

Part I
THE RESURRECTED NATIONS IN EUROPE

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Czecho-Slovakia 3

II. Jugoslavia . 33

III. Albania . 66

IV. Ukraine 83

V. Poland 105

VI. Lithuania 132

VII. Lettonia 146

VIII. Esthonia 163

IX. Finland 172

Part II
THE RESURRECTED NATIONS IN ASIA

I. Arabia 193

II. Palestine 211

III. Syria . 227

IV. Mesopotamia . 238

V. Assyria 245

YI. Kurdistan 254

vii

viii CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

VII. Armenia 263

VIII. Georgia 292

IX. Azerbaijan 303

ETHNOGRAPHIC MAPS

I. Czecho-Slovaki a, Jugoslavia AND Albania 31
11. Ukraine and Poland 103

III. Lithuania, Lettonia, Esthonia and Fin-

land 161

IV. Arabia, Palestine, Syria, and Mesopo-

^■^^, TAMIA 225

V. Assyria, Kurdistan, Armenia, Georgia,

AND Azerbaijan 261

Pabt I

THE RESURRECTED NATIONS
IN EUROPE

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA

Of all the romantic national resurrections of
the Great War the romance of the birth of Czecho-
slovakia is the most wonderful. Perhaps never
before in the history of nations was the regener-
ation of a people accompanied by such glory as
that which attended the rise of the Czecho-Slovaks
from the mediaeval darkness that was Austria-
Hungary. In 1914 they were one of the least
known of the world's oppressed nationalities; the
Poles, the Finns, the Jews had attracted much
more attention than the little heroic nation that
preserved its identity in spite of centuries of
grinding between the German and Magyar mill-
stones. Hereafter none of the newly risen nations
will overshadow the Czecho-Slovaks.

Czecho-Slovakia's existence as a sovereign na-
tion has already been determined by the deeds of
its own sons. Some of the liberated nationalities
look to the great powers helpless, in quest of jus-
tice. Others may become ' ' spheres of influence ' ' of
certain powerful states. But the Czecho-Slovaks
have won their independence in the course of the

3

4 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

war by force of arms, and have secured it by con-
tributing materially to the collapse of the Central
Powers. Czecho-Slovakia is, therefore, a full-
fledged member of the European family of nations.

The Czecho-Slovaks were the pioneers of the
Slavs in Europe, forming a bulwark against the
German onslaughts toward the east. It has been
said that the Czecho-Slovaks made possible the
rise and development of Poland, and it was the
latter, together with Lithuania, that stopped the
Teutonic movement in the direction of Russia,
preventing the formation between the Dnieper and
the Rhine of a huge German empire.

The Czecho-Slovaks penetrated into the very
heart of Europe, establishing themselves in the
geographical center of the continent. The Czechs
and the Slovaks are one and the same race, but
were early divided by their conquerors. The first,
inhabiting Bohemia, Moravia and some sections
of Silesia, were incorporated with Austria. The
second, living in so-called Slovakia, were subju-
gated by the Magj^ars and became part of Hun-
gary. United, the land of the Czecho-Slovaks is
bounded on the north by Germany and Poland;
on the west by Germany ; on the south by Austria
and Hungary, and on the east by Ukraine. Geo-
graphically, then, the Czecho-Slovaks formed the
very backbone of the disrupted Dual Monarchy.
Numerically, they were far from being a negli-
gible quantity, as there are about seven and a

CZECHOSLOVAKIA 5

half million Czechs and three million Slovaks.
Economically, Bohemia was the most developed
and productive part of Austria, yielding five times
as much coal as the rest of the State, twice as
many agricultural products, and bearing sixty-
three per cent, of Austria's taxation.

The history of the Czechs goes back almost to
the beginning of the Christian era. Nearly two
thousand years ago their forefathers waged bit-
ter warfare against the Teutons. They established
their supremacy after several centuries of
struggle, and already in the seventh century Bo-
hemia emerges as a consolidated nation. Chris-
tianity was introduced into Moravia in the ninth
century by two Greek missionaries, and was fol-
lowed by an expansion of the country resulting
in the creation of a great state comprising Bo-
hemia proper, Moravia, Slovakia, part of Silesia
and Galicia. Then came the Magyars. In 907
they overran Slovakia and Moravia, establishing
themselves permanently in the former province.
A war ensued which afforded an opportunity to
Boleslaw the Brave, of Poland, to place his brother
on the Bohemian throne. The latter, in order to
keep himself in power, invoked German aid and
protection, opening a thousand-year struggle be-
tween the Czechs and Germans.

In the eleventh and twelfth centuries the Ger-
man rulers sought to secure for themselves the
Bohemian crown, provoking internal dissension

6 THE RESUERECTED NATIONS

favoring their designs. However, early in the
thirteenth centuiy a purely Czech dynasty was
set up in Bohemia, which soon became, under
Ottakar II, a powerful state, extending as far \
south as the Adriatic. This ruler became involved
in a war with Rome at a time when internal
strife pervaded his empire and lost all his newly
won possessions, dying in battle against the Habs-
burg Emperor Rudolph, in 1278. Twenty-eight
years later his grandson was assassinated, ending
the native dynasty. The German rulers of the
Roman Empire claimed the Bohemian throne, and
John of Luxemburg, son of Emperor Henry, was,
after some unhappy choices, elected by the Czechs
to be their king. He was a friend of France, estab-
lishing close relations between the French and
the Czechs. King John was succeeded by his son,
Charles, who raised the prestige and power of
Bohemia to great heights. He was the chosen
head of the Roman Empire, but made Prague his
capital and founded a great university there.
Civilization made tremendous progress in Bo-
hemia during his reign, and Charles is still re-
garded by the Czechs as the greatest ruler in the
history of their country. He devoted all his ener-
gies to the task of upbuilding and uplifting
Bohemia, dying in the midst of his labors in 1378.
It was during the reign of his successor that the
epoch-making movement for church reform, which
had taken root iU Bohemia, assumed definite shape

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 7

under the leadership of John Huss, the first cham-
pion of freedom of thought in Europe in the
Middle Ages, preceding Luther by a century. The
Hussite cause was more than a fight against the
corruption of the Roman Church; it was also a
Czech national movement. Nearly the entire
nation followed Huss and adopted his doctrines.
He was tried at Constance by a religious council,
declared a heretic, and burned at the stake on July
6, 1415. Among the articles of accusation at the
trial was one stating that Huss had instigated
among his countrymen national hatred against the
Germans. To this he replied: "I have affirmed
and yet affirm that Bohemians should by right
have the chief place in the offices of the Kingdom
of Bohemia, even as they that are French-born in
the Kingdom of France, and the Germans in their
own countries, where the Bohemian might have
the faculty to rule his people and the Germans
bear rule over the Germans." The martyrdom
of Huss was of inestimable value to the Czech
national movement.

' ' The murderers of John Huss were able to bum
his quivering body and scatter its ashes in the
River Rhine," writes Professor Charles D. Hazen.
''Bat they could not extinguish the glory and the
power of his life and teaching. As has so often
happened in this world, those who sat in the seats
of the mighty proved unnecessarily purblind.
The vivid human spirit is a spark that is not

8 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

easily snuffed out but very easily sets the world
in conflagration. It was so in the instance of John
Huss, wliose fate inflamed the entire Czech nation
to avenge his death. The famous Hussite Wars,
wars of religion, also racial wars, revealed the
Czechs to themselves and to all Europe, and
stamped indelible glory upon the Bohemian flag
and created a legend, a legend true and authentic,
which has set Czech blood tingling ever since with
the ecstasy of national pride, of national devotion.

**It is no wonder that this people is hopelessly
wedded to the ideas of liberty and independence.
The spirit of the nation was adequately and
superbly expressed once and for all in the person
of John Huss. Happy, indeed, is that people
which has constantly in the forefront of its con-
sciousness so unblemished a character, so dis-
tinguished an intellect, so noble a life. For his
devotion to the two supreme principles of individ-
ual and national freedom John Huss paid with his
life. He never once deflected from his principles,
he never flinched before the hideous fate which
the brutality of his age devised for him. No
nation in the world possesses a more dazzling
oriflamme than Bohemia possesses in the career
of John Huss."

The death of Huss was the signal for a long
and bloody struggle. The Czech nobles met and
passed a resolution of protest against the execu-
tion of Huss, whom they characterized as ''a good,

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 9

just and Catholic man who had for many years
been favorably known in the kingdom by his life,
conduct and fame, and who had been convicted of
no offense," adding that his accusers were ''liars,
vile traitors and calumniators of Bohemia and
Moravia, the worst of all heretics, full of all evil,
sons of the devil." This protest was despatched
to the council at Constance and was taken as a
declaration of war by the Roman Church. In the
battles that followed the German settlers of Bo-
hemia supported the Roman Church. However,
the Czechs, led by the blind Zizka, a popular hero,
fought valiantly, repeatedly defeating the enemy
forces, and ended with invasion of Hungary and
the German states. The Roman Church was com-
pelled to make concessions and recognize the
Hussites.

With the passing of the external danger there
developed in Bohemia a long quarrel over the
status of the monarchy, whether it was elective
or hereditary. The country was divided into two
parties. King Matthias, of Hungary, took ad-
vantage of the internal strife and invaded Mo-
ravia. Supported by the Catholics, he was pro-
claimed King of Bohemia, in opposition to George
of Podebrad, the leader of the national, Hussite,
elements. There were thus two kings ruling over
the Czechs. With the death of George, Matthias
of Hungary appeared to have obtained control
over Bohemia,, but the Hussites proceeded to

10 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

elect Prince Wladislaw of Poland as their king.
There ensued a protracted struggle between the
two rulers, which ended in 1490, when Wladislaw
was chosen, upon the death of Matthias, to the
Hungarian throne. During the reign of Wladislaw
serfdom was introduced into Bohemia, and the
nobles were granted privileges which they had
never possessed. Wladislaw died in 1516, and his
son Louis, King of Hungary, and successor to the
Bohemian throne, perished in 1526 in a campaign
against the Turks.

That was a fateful year in the history of the
Czech people, marking the establishment of Habs-
burg rule over Bohemia, a rule which was to last
nearly four centuries, carrying with it oppression,
persecution and desolation. A diet representing
the nobles, clergy and townsmen gave to Archduke
Ferdinand of Austria, of the Habsburgs, the Bo-
hemian crown on October 23, 1526. Ferdinand
was an ambitious ruler and succeeded, in spite of
some opposition, in promulgating a charter stat-
ing that he had been elected King of Bohemia be-
cause of the hereditary claims of his wife, Anna.
Then came the great Protestant movement in Ger-
many which was related to the Hussite cause.
The German Protestants, hard pressed by Rome,
whose emperor was a brother of Ferdinand, ap-
pealed to the Czechs for support. On the other
hand, the Roman ruler appealed to his brother
for aid to suppress the Protestauts. Ferdinand

CZECHOSLOVAKIA 11

made an attempt to raise an army, but it refused
to follow him into Germany. The Czechs had a
number of grievances against Ferdinand and rose
against him, meeting in a national assembly to
demand the re-establishment of the electiveness
of the monarchy, religious liberty, and other
rights. An army was raised by the assembly for
the purpose of lending support to the German
Protestants, but it was too late as the Protestants
in Germany had been crushed. Ferdinand then
forced the Czechs to renounce their sympathy for
the reformers of Germany. He returned to his
country and occupied Prague with an army of
foreign mercenaries, punished the leaders of the
revolt, and persecuted the Czechs in various ways.
He established the Jesuits in Bohemia, and they
proved a very oppressive factor in Bohemian
national life. He also succeeded in making the
Bohemian throne hereditary for the Habsburgs,
which definitely placed Bohemia under Austrian
rule.

For a century the Hussites were hard pressed
by the Habsburg rulers and their Jesuits. The
Czechs and the Hussites now became identical.
The Habsburgs and the Catholics were one and
the same, on the other hand. The struggle that
went on from generation to generation in Bo-
hemia was therefore a religious-political move-
ment. The Czechs continued to demand religious
liberty. The Catholics, supported by the Habs-

12 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

burgs, did not relax their persecution of the Hus-
sites. With the accession to the throne, in June,
1617, of Ferdinand, Duke of Styria, who was a
fanatical opponent of the Protestants, a crisis in
the Bohemian situation was not long delayed. Due
to the aggression of the Catholics, a revolt was
precipitated in May, 1618, which was in fact the
beginning of the Thirty Years' War. The rebel-
lion was a movement on the part of the Czechs
to get rid of the Habsburgs, to win religious and
national freedom. King Ferdinand was formally
deposed and a Protestant prince elected king.
This was the signal for the bitter religious wars
that involved nearly all of Europe, and which were
fought mostly on Bohemian territory.

At the beginning of this period of warfare Bo-
hemia had a population of three million; at its
end there were only eight hundred thousand in-
habitants left in Bohemia. Protestantism was
wiped out with fire and sword. The Czech nobility
was mercilessly rooted out and their lands con-
fiscated. Bohemia's ancient rights were abro-
gated. Catholicism was forced upon the surviv-
ing population, while in place of the Bohemian
aristocracy an alien ruling class was planted by
the Habsburgs. With the downfall of Czech
national power also came the end of Bohemian
literature which had flourished in the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries. The Jesuits made it one of
their chief purposes to destroy systematically the

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 13

Czecli literature. One Jesuit leader boasted that
"he had himself burned no fewer than 60,000
Czech volumes ! ' ' The Czechs were made the sub-
jects of Austria and their land became a province
of the absolute monarchy of the Habsburgs.

From 1620, when the battle of the White Moun-
tain, in which the Czechs were disastrously beaten,
was fought, up to the nineteenth century, Czech
national life was extinguished. The Jesuits pro-
moted the work of Germanization through their
control of the educational institutions. When
the grip of the Jesuits was broken through the
suppression of their order, the Habsburgs ini-
tiated their own policy of Germanization. In the
course of the eighteenth century the Bohemian
institutions were limited gradually in their power,
till they became mere shells. This policy culmi-
nated in the refusal of Joseph II to be crowned at
Prague as King of Bohemia, thus robbing the
Czechs of their last vestige of independence.

Early in the nineteenth century a group of
Czech scholars devoted themselves to the revival
of the almost forgotten Czech language. They
succeeded in raising it from its low state, thereby
laying the foundations of the Czecho-Slovak
national movement. Literary societies and clubs
sprang up among the Czechs. Several poets ap-
peared and a National Museum was founded in
1818. A great historian, Francis Palacky (1798-
1876), entered upon Bohemia's arena and exerted

14 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

tremendous influence over the fortunes of his
people. The foremost historian of Bohemia, he
also became the acknowledged leader of the
modern national movement. Palacky was helped
in his labors by a group of brilliant men of letters.
The Bohemians under Palacky never went further
than a demand for their constitutional rights, i.e.,
the restoration of Bohemian autonomy under the
Habsburgs. It was clearly conceived by the Czech
leaders that Austria was built upon the back of
Bohemia; that the total separation of the latter
from the former would plunge Europe into a gen-
eral war; and that the limit of Bohemian aspi-
rations should, therefore, be national existence
within the boundaries of a federated Austrian
Empire.

The revolutionary year of 1848 is memorable
in the history of Bohemia. Prague became a lead-
ing center of rebellion and for a time succeeded in
wresting from the Austrian Emperor recognition
of the Czech demands. However, the revolution
was crushed throughout Austria-Hungary, and
Bohemia was forced to return to its old status.
A reign of persecution against liberal and national
thought was inaugurated by Austria, which, of
course, only helped the dissemination of revolu-
tionary ideas. When Austria began to suffer
miMtary defeats, beginning with 1859, the Habs-
burgs relaxed their despotic rule. Francis Jo-
seph promised to a Czech deputation, in 1861, to

CZECHOSLOVAKIA 15

be crowned as King of Bohemia. But he never
carried the promise out. In 1866 Austria was
again in the throes of a struggle, this time with
Prussia, which ended disastrously. Again the
Habsburgs tried to win the favor of their op-
pressed nationalities. To strengthen the empire
the Austrians made an agreement with the Mag-
yars, whereby the latter obtained virtual inde-
pendence and control over part of the Slavonic
races of the empire. It was an arrangement be-
tween the two strongest parties, the Germans and
the Magyars. The Germans alone could not
last long, in view of their minority; they there-
fore decided to share their power with the next
strongest element in the state — Hungary — and in
1867 the Dual Monarchy came into existence.

The Czechs violently protested against this
arrangement, which incidentally placed their
brothers, the Slovaks, again under the heel of the
Hungarians. The agitation to restore Bohemia's
old constitutional position assumed such propor-
tions that Francis Joseph promised again to be
crowned King of Bohemia, just as he had become
King of Hungary. In a message to the Bohemian
Diet, meeting at Prague, he declared that ' ' in con-
sideration of the former constitutional position of
Bohemia and remembering the power and glory
which its crown had given to his ancestors, and
the constant fidelity of its population, he gladly
recognized the rights of the kingdom of Bohemia,

16 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

and was willing to confirm this assurance by tak-
ing the coronation oath." Again he failed to
carry out his pledge.

The whole course of European history might
have been different had Francis Joseph kept his
word and established Austria on a federal basis.
Perhaps the chief cause of the Great War was the
struggle between German-Magyar nationalism
and Slavonic nationalism. The Austrian Empire
was composed of a majority of Slavs and a minor-
ity of Germans and Magyars. The satisfaction of
the legitimate and reasonable claims of the former
half a century ago would have insured the safety
of the Austrian imperial structure. The first step
toward the erection of a federal empire was the
granting of the constitutional demands of the
Czechs. Francis Joseph, however, did not resist
the aggressive policies of the Germans and Mag-
yars. Both were minorities. Both ruled Slavonic
majorities. Both sought to maintain their tyr-
anny and to impress upon the subject peoples their
own nationalism. Both, therefore, opposed the
creation of an autonomous Bohemia. And both
were directly responsible for the fate that has now
befallen Austria and Hungary.

After 1867 the Czech national movement entered
a new phase. Bohemian literature and arts made
tremendous strides, giving birth to a powerful
movement to make the Czech language the domi-
nant tongue in Bohemia's schools and govern-

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 1?

ment institutions. The German language was
boycotted, and Czech nationalism was fostered by
the Young Czechs, who believed in extremes, and
opposed the previous policy of ineffective pro-
tests. Basing their doctrines on the fact that
three-fifths of the Austrian population were Slavs,
the Young Czechs started out with the idea of
converting Austria into a kingdom dominated by
Slavs, rather than by Germans. The fight waged
by the Young Czechs was both external and inter-
nal. There were large colonies in Bohemia who
were either of German origin or under the in-
fluence of German civilization. These were aided
by outside forces, mainly Prussian. In spite of
their obstinate resistance, the Czech nationalists
gradually asserted their supremacy. In 1881
they won the right to the University of Prague,
which since then has been completely Czech. In
1891 the Young Czechs became the dominant Bo-
hemian power in the Imperial Reichsrat. In 1897
the Czech language was formally declared from
Vienna as official, possessed of equal rights with
the German. This was the signal for a new period
of hostility and wrangling between the Germans
and the Czechs. The former were furious, and the
two elements not infrequently came to blows in
the Austrian Parliament.

The growth of socialism in Austria and the Rus-
sian Revolution of 1905 introduced a new element
into the nationalistic feuds. Universal suffrage

18 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

was advocated, and the German radicals were sup-
ported by the Czechs and other oppressed nation-
ahties in their demands. This reform was finally
promulgated, and in 1907 a parliament represent-
ing, on a basis of equal suffrage, all the parties
and national groups of Austria met in Vienna.

The Great War found Bohemian nationalism
developed to its highest degree. Naturally it was
in sympathy with the Southern Slavs of Serbia,
against whom was directed the famous Austrian
ultimatum of July, 1914. The Czechs had all
along been friendly toward Russia, for it was
there that Pan-Slavism was born, looking toward
the liberation of the Slavs from the German-
Magyar yoke. But to the Habsburgs the Czecho-
slovaks were Austro-Hungarian subjects. They
were soldiers of the imperial armies. When a
call for war sounded, they were expected to rise
to the support of their oppressors. They had
done so in the eighteenth and in the nineteenth
centuries. Their Slavonic brethren under ^he
Habsburgs had done so, too, and were going to
do so again, in 1914. Wouldn't the Czecho-
slovaks act likewise? It did not enter the Habs-
burgs' minds that they wouldn't.

But when the Czech regiments were marched
to the front to fight their Serbian, and Russian
brothers, they showed unmistakably where they
stood in the great crisis. In Prague itself, in
September, 1914, the 28th Regiment, composed of

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 19

the sons of the Bohemian capital, gave vent to the
emotions of the people by singing Pan-Slavic
hymns and by openly bearing a banner on which
was inscribed: ''We are marching against the
Russians, but nobody knows why. ' ' The populace
of Prague gave an ovation to its brave rebels, and
the Austrian officers did not dare to remove the
revolutionary banner. Although in Austrian uni-
forms, under foreign commanders, the Czech
soldiers exhibited their defiance of tradition and
established authority by deserting in mass, or
singly, to the ' ' enemy. ' ' The 8th, 11th Landwehr,
28th, 30th, 88th and 102nd Regiments of the Aus-
trian army, had gone over, within a year of the
outbreak of the war, to the Russians in regiments,
companies, and in small groups. They were
Czech regiments, imbued with a powerful national
consciousness, totally opposed to the Habsburg
rule and government. Parallel with this attitude
on the part of the Czechs the Austrian authorities
assumed toward Bohemia a policy of suppression
and persecution. The Czechs were "traitors.''
The whole nation was accused by Vienna of high
treason. According to the pre-war standards it
was treason, for the Czechs were subjects of the
Habsburg dynasty. But a new era was beginning
for the "subject" nationalities of the world.
They were to break old conventions. The Czechs
Were the first to lead the oppressed races toward
a new conception of resurgent nationalism. Mean-

20 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

while persecutions at home grew more violent.
The Czech radical leaders were arrested. Many
eminent figures in Bohemian national life were
persecuted or forced to remain in hiding. Profes-
sor Thomas Gr. Masaryk, the foremost Czech of
our time, secretly left his country and came to
France and England to work for its independence.
Together with other exiles he organized abroad a
Czecho-Slovak National Council, of which he was
elected president. The council took an uncom-
promising attitude toward the Dual Monarchy.
It issued in November, 1915, a manifesto which
read, in part, as follows :

*'A11 Bohemian political parties have up to this
time been fighting for a qualified independence
within the limits of Austria-Hungary. But the
events of this terrible war and the reckless vio-
lence of Vienna constrain us to claim indepen-
dence without regard to Austria-Hungary. We
ask for an independent Bohemian-Slovak state.
The Bohemian people are now convinced that they
must strike out for themselves."

And they proceeded to do so. As the number
of Czecho-Slovak deserters to Russia increased,
they began to ask of the Tsar's government per-
mission to organize a military unit and fight the
Austro-Germans. But the Tsar's ministers looked
askance at this request. The Czechs were Aus-
trian subjects and should remain loyal to Austria.
Otherwise, the soldiers of the many oppressed

CZECHOSLOVAKIA 21

nationalities of the Tsar would desert to the Teu-
tons an4 be organized by them into national units
to fight against Russia. So the Czechs were in-
terned in the depths of the empire, in Siberia,
Turkestan and other remote regions. They were
prisoners of war and treated as such. Only with
great difficulty and with the help of the Czech
colony in Russia was permission finally obtained
from the Tsar's goverimient to organize a Czecho-
slovak legion.

Then came the Russian Revolution. From every
corner of vast Russia Czechs and Slovaks wormed
their way toward the headquarters of their legion.
The desertions from the Austrian army also con-
stantly augmented its ranks. But the big oppor-
tunity was still in store for the former subjects
of the Habsburgs. There were plenty of soldiers
in Russia. The Czecho-Slovaks had to do some-
thing more than merely band themselves into regi-
ments and join the Russian army, in order to at-
tain distinction. They did it in the course of the
only offensive attempted by the Revolution against
the Central Powers, the famous Kornilov move-
ment of July 1, 1917. The Russian soldiers lost
heart and stampeded to the rear. Only the Czecho-
slovak brigade and the Finnish troops advanced.
The Commander in Chief, General Brusilov, made
a report which sent the name of the Czecho-
slovaks resounding from one end of Russia to
the other. "The Czecho-Slovaks," he wrote,

22 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

"perfidiously abandoned at Taniopol by our in-
fantry, fought in such a way that the world ought
to fall on its knees before them. ' '

There, on the Galician battlefield, in July, 1917,
the foundation was really laid for the Czecho-
slovak Republic. The National Council was
bound to remain an academic body as long as it
was not backed by an army in the field. When
such a force did appear, the whole complexion of
the Bohemian problem underwent a deep change.
The Czecho-Slovaks set themselves to obtain Al-
lied recognition of their army. There was a
small contingent of Czecho-Slovaks fighting in
France, Bohemia's traditional friend. In De-
cember, 1917, a decree signed by the President,
Premier and Foreign Minister of France, author-
ized the formation of a Czecho-Slovak army as a
part of the French army. The text of this remark-
able document reveals the reason for the subse-
quent conduct of the Czecho-Slovaks in Russia.
It read, in part :

"(1) The Czecho-Slovaks, organized in an au-
tonomous army and recognizing the superior au-
thority of the French High Command from the
military point of view, will under their own flag
fight against the Central Powers.

"(2) Politically, this national army is placed
under the direction of the Czecho-Slovak National
Council whose headquarters are in Paris.

CZECHOSLOVAKIA 23

^* (3) The formation of the Czecho-Slovak army
is guaranteed by the French Government.

*'(4) The Czecho-Slovak army will be subject
to the same dispositions as regards organization,
hierarchy, administration, and military discipline
as those in force in the French Army.

'' (5) The Czecho-Slovak army will be recruited
from among —

^' (a) Czecho-Slovaks at present serving with

the French army;
''(b) Czecho-Slovaks from other countries,
admitted to be transferred to the
Czecho-Slovak army;
" (c) All those who will voluntarily enter this
army for the duration of the war. ' '

There were to be 120,000 soldiers in the Czecho-
slovak army. A volunteer recruiting campaign
was launched in the United States and other coun-
tries where there were Czecho-Slovak immigrants.
Finally, money was advanced by the Allies to the
Czecho-Slovak National Council to enable the
legions in Russia to go to Vladivostok and thence
to France, for with the conclusion of the Brest-
Litovsk peace between Russia and the Central
Powers the Czecho-Slovak units left the front and
concentrated at Bakhmatch, near Kiev, in Ukraine.
The Ukrainian government which had negotiated
separately with the Central Powers was repudi-
ated by the Ukranian masses and was compelled

24 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

to call on the Germans to keep it in power. There
followed a battle between the Teutons and the
Ukrainian and Russian Red Guards. The Czecho-
slovaks suddenly found themselves threatened by
the advancing enemy. The Russian troops, with
the exception of a small force, were fleeing east-
ward. There was no choice for the Czechs but to
do the same, leaving a regiment to fight a rear-
guard action. There was a severe clash at Bakh-
match, where the Czecho-Slovaks suffered a loss
of about six hundred dead and wounded, but ac-
counted for at least two thousand German corpses,
which they buried in one day !

Then began the Czecho-Slovak march across
Eastern Europe and Asia. Armed to the teeth,
with three hundred machine-guns to a regiment,
artillery, airplanes, automobiles, horses, all of
which they gathered in the disorganized and aban-
doned war zone, the Czecho-Slovaks formed train
after train and ran them toward the east. As the
trains proceeded the German and Austrian govern-
ments began to realize that a new menace was
being created for them. Hitherto the relations
between the Czecho-Slovaks and the Russian revo-
lutionists were most amiable. The Bolsheviki, it
is true, tried to convert the Czechs to their point
of view by propaganda, telling them that they were
being duped by the Allies. But the Germans be-
gan to exert pressure on the Bolshevist govern-
ment to stop the progress of the Czecho-Slovaks,

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 25

on the ground that Eussia was neutral and could
not allow armed forces to organize on and go from
its territory to fight nations with whom Russia
was at peace. The Russian authorities then pro-
posed to the Czecho-Slovaks to disarm. After
some negotiations they turned over all their equip-
ment to the Russians, except ten rifles for each one
hundred men, on condition that their unmolested
passage be guaranteed. With this understand-
ing they resumed their movement.

Slowly, winding over thousands of miles of
railroad, eighty trains filled with Czecho-Slovaks
moved toward Vladivostok. From the Volga to
the Pacific they dotted railroad stations, villages,
big and little towns. Finally the first of the long
procession reached Vladivostok. It was spring,
1918. The Central Powers expected the Czechs to
get stuck in the vastness of Siberia and never
reach their goal. But when that first train, after
many vicissitudes and difficulties, arrived at the
Far Eastern port, they resolved to take action.
Under their pressure the Bolshevist government
issued an order to stop the Czecho-Slovaks.
Along the entire line the trains were halted by Red
Guards, among whom were German and Magyar
war prisoners who were supposed to have turned
into revolutionists, but many of whom were loyal
to Vienna and Berlin. Thus at Irkutsk, accord-
ing to a Czech officer, the following occurred, in
his own words.

26 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

''Our train, about four hundred men, armed
with ten rifles and twenty hand grenades, was sur-
rounded by a few thousand Red Guards, armed
with machine gnns and cannon. Their comman-
der gave our men ten minutes to surrender their
arms or be shot. According to their habit, our
men began negotiations. Suddenly there was
heard a German command, 'Schiessen!' and the
Red Guards began firing at the train. Our men
jumped oft and in five minutes all the machine
guns were in their possession, the Russian Bolshe-
viki disarmed, and all the Germans and Magyars
done away with. ' '

Similar scenes occurred along the entire route.
An understanding was reached with the Siberian
Soviet whereby the Czecho-Slovaks east of Irkutsk
were allowed to proceed to Vladivostok. But the
trains stalled between the Volga and Irkutsk were
not so fortunate. Their successful resistance to
the efforts of the Red Guards to disarm them and
turn them back to Russia provoked the hostility
of the Moscow authorities, who proclaimed a mobi-
lization against them and arrested their delegates.
Nevertheless the Czecho-Slovaks continued to
seek an understanding with the Bolshevist govern-
ment. But meanwhile the tale of their stand re-
verberated throughout the world. The relations
between the AUies and Moscow were strained.
The armies of the former were now under the
supreme command of General Foch, and the

CZECHOSLOVAKIA 27

Czecho-Slovak army was subject to the orders of
the French High Command. In the latter part of
June, 1918, an order went out from Paris to the
Czecho-Slovaks in Siberia, instructing them to turn
back and occupy all the Great Siberian Railroad
and hold the cities along the Volga against the
Bolsheviki. It was not to the taste of the Czecho-
slovaks to fight the Russians, but orders were
orders. They carried out a series of brilliant
military moves, which won for them complete rec-
ognition by the Allies and the United States of
their national aims.

On October 18, 1918, Czecho-Slovakia declared
its independence and on November 14 a National
Assembly met in Prague and proclaimed the estab-
lishment of a Czecho-Slovak Republic. Thomas
G. Masaryk, then in the United States, was unani-
mously acclaimed as the first President of the
Republic. A provisional government was formed,
headed by Dr. Karel Kramarz, a veteran fighter
for Czecho-Slovak nationalism, numbering eigh-
teen members, six of whom were Socialists. Ac-
cording to a statement made by Premier Kramarz
in December to a delegation representing so-called
German Bohemia, which had been occupied by
Czecho-Slovak troops, the Allies had signed an
agreement by which the entire country claimed by
the Czecho-Slovaks was to belong to the new state,
exempting it from the jurisdiction of the Peace
Conference. The German minority in Bohemia

28 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

is very considerable, and claims the right of estab-
lishing its own autonomous government, with the
capital at Reichenberg, fifty-eight miles northeast
of Prague. Asked by a correspondent how the
Czecho-Slovaks would solve their internal Ger-
man problem, President Masaryk replied :

"After all, what does the whole matter come
down to? Language and politics. First, we shall
give them (the German Bohemians) their own
schools, conducted in German. How many Ger-
man-speaking inhabitants must there be in any
one district before a German school shall be
opened there? Well, the general feeling is that
any district which can furnish forty German
pupils is entitled to a German school. Who shall
pay the schools? Shall the Czecho-Slovak com-
munities pay for theirs and the Germans for
theirs? Or shall the state pay for all the schools
by general taxation? I am in favor of the latter
method. It will be more just to those German-
speaking communities which are small and there-
fore less able to bear the expense of a school.

' ' From the schools let us proceed to the courts.
These shall be bilingual throughout. What more
can the Germans want? Then there is the political
constitution. Germans, as Germans, will be able
to vote for their own representatives in parlia-
ment. That is to say, there will be absolute minor-
ity recognition in every respect." 1

It remains to be seen whether President Mas-]

CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 29

aryk's policy will provide a solution for the for-
eign national minorities in the newly erected
states. Bohemia's problem is typical of the diffi-
culties confronting most of the other liberated
nationalities. If it fails in Czecho-Slovakia, the
idea of setting up permanent peace in Europe
through a settlement of the various national
claims is bankrupt, entailing the bankruptcy of
the institution of political nationalism. Czecho-
slovakia is the most civilized, as well as the most
tolerant of all the resurrected nations. Thomas G.
Masaryk is undoubtedly the most gifted exponent
of the cause of the small nationalities in the world.
He is second to none among the European states-
men in knowledge and understanding of inter-
national affairs.

Bom on March 6, 1850, of a poor family in Mo-
ravia, Thomas Masaryk began his career in life
as an apprentice to a blacksmith, but succeeded in
entering high school and making his way through
the University of Vienna, where he became, in
1879, instructor in philosophy. Three years later
he was appointed professor at the Prague Uni-
versity. In 1891 Masaryk was elected deputy to
the Reichsrat, but resigned two years later to for-
mulate a practical national problem for the Czechs.
He founded the Realist party, which entertained
no illusions as to the nature of the Habsburgs. He
became known throughout Europe by his great
works on Czech national questions and history, on

30 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Marxism, on Russia, and other subjects. In 1907
he was re-elected deputy to the Vienna Parlia-
ment, waging since then relentless warfare against
the Austro-Hungarian bureaucracies.

''A man of great learning and well posted in all
contemporary ideas and movements, whether phil-
osophical, literary, political or social," writes of
Masaryk one of his countrymen, ''he began to
facilitate the spread of all such movements in Bo-
hemia. . . . University professor, philosopher,
writer, publicist, journalist, his eyes were always
turned to the practical side of things and to the
everyday problems of national life. He founded
reviews and libraries, encouraged the publication
of foreign works and contributed largely to the
knowledge of all other European nations. It was
under his auspices that Russian and French liter-
ature penetrated to Bohemia, and that the master-
pieces of English literature became familiar to
the Czechs. . . . He thus influenced the whole
youth of Bohemia, and his ideas spread also
among the Serbs, Croats, Slovenes and Ruthenes.
Masaryk, in fact, carried on the glorious tradition
of the great Czech patriots of the ninetenth cen-
tury, 'the national awakeners,' and was himself
the last of them. With him begins a new phase in
the history of the Czech people, which from now
on takes its place side by side with the other
European nations in virtue of its intellectual,
moral, and material development."

The ethnographic boundaries of Czeeho-Slovakia, Jugoslavia and Albania.
The section between Trieste and Pola is Italian in population.

n

JUGOSLAVIA

Jugoslavia is the land of the Southern Slavs.
The word ''jug" in Slavic means ''south." The
Jugoslavs and the Southern Slavs are therefore
synonymous terms. Racially the Jugoslavs in-
clude the Bulgars, Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.
Politically, however, the Bulgars have dissociated
themselves from the Southern Slavs. Jugoslavia
in its current usage is therefore primarily a politi-
cal term, applied to the territory inhabited by
Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.

This territory is a huge block nearly two hun-
dred miles wide, bounded on the west by Italy
and the Adriatic Sea ; on the north by Austria and
Hungary ; on the east by Eumania and Bulgaria ;
and on the south by Greece and Albania. It com-
prises Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
Dalmatia, Croatia-Slavonia, Carniola, and sec-
tions of Istria, Goritzia, Styria, Carinthia, Ba-
ranya, Backa and the Banat. All of these, except
the first two, were provinces of Austria and Hun-
gary before the outbreak of the World War. The
population of entire Jugoslavia exceeds twelve

33

34 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

million, more than a third of which falls to Serbia
and Montenegro.

The Slovenes, the least numerous of the Jugo-
slavs, numbering only about a million and a half,
inhabit the northwestern end of the country, sur-
rounded by the Italians to the west and the Aus-
trians to the north. The Croats occupy the cen-
tral regions of Jugoslavia, and the Serbs and
Montenegrins are at the extreme south and east.
While the language of the Croats and Serbs is
nearly identical, that of the Slovenes is a distinct
dialect. These linguistic differences are undoubt-
edly the result of the forced estrangement of the
various elements of the Jugoslav race in the course
of centuries of struggle and slavery.

In their early history, the Jugoslavs appear as
one people. Fifteen centuries ago they crossed
from the Carpathian ranges and established them-
selves in their present homeland, under the aegis
of Byzantium. A historian of the seventh cen-
tury tells of a number of Slavs taken prisoner
on the Danube by the soldiers of the Byzantine
Emperor Mavricius (582-602), and describes them
as tall, broad-shouldered men, armed only with
pikes, and in appearance quite harmless and good-
natured. In reply to questions as to their identity
they said: "We are Slavs, coming from the far-
off sea. We do not know steel or arms, we graze
our herds, make music with our pipes and do not
harm anyone."

I

JUGOSLAVIA 35

The Slovenes were subjugated during the reign
of Charlemagne, toward the end of the eighth
century, by German lords, who, however, op-
pressed them so severely that they revolted. Out
of this rebellion sprang the first Jugoslav state.
Under the leadership of one of their chiefs, Lude-
vit Posavsai, the Slovenes formed a powerful
kingdom. This was the first and only time in the
life of the Jugoslavs that all of their elements
were united in one state. The Slovenian kingdom
soon succumbed to its mighty neighbors. The
Croats, however, evolved an independent state of
their own in the ninth century. Toward the end of
the tenth century it became impoverished as a
result of participation in the wars that raged in
Europe at that time. In 1102, at the extinction of
the Croatian dynasty, the Hungarian king was
elected to the throne of Croatia. Since then it has
been part of Hungary and later the Dual Mon-
archy. Croatia remained for centuries an autono-
mous state, as the Hungarian kings, upon their
accession to the throne, would also be crowned as
kings of Croatia. This practice continued till the
Croat resistance to the Magyar domination weak-
ened.

An important element of division was intro-
duced among the Jugoslavs in the eleventh cen-
tury, when the Christian Church split into the
Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic branches.
The southeastern Jugoslavs came under the in-

36 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

fluence of the first, wliile the northwestern Jugo-
slavs fell under the domination of Rome. The re-
sult was that the two churches were established
in Jugoslavia. The Greek Orthodox elements be-
came known as Serbs, while the Roman Catholics
were called Croats and Slovenes.

Up to the twelfth century the Serbs remained
in their tribal state, not infrequently falling vic-
tims to their strong Bulgarian brothers. When
the Bulgarian empire of the ninth and tenth cen-
turies collapsed, the Serbs paid tribute to Byzan-
tium. In 1159, under the leadership of their first
national figure, Stephen Neman j a, the Serbs con-
stituted themselves into an independent state,
comprising parts of Dalmatia and Montenegro.
It was during the reign of Stephen Nemanja 's son
that Serbia finally identified herself with the East-
ern Church.

Serbia rose to the zenith of her power in the
fourteenth century under the rule of Stephen Dus-
han, a great general, reformer and statesman.
During his reign Serbia waged thirteen campaigns
against Byzantium. He extended his dominions
as far as the Gulf of Corinth in the south and
Adrianople in the east. Louis the Great, of Hun-
gary, found himself menaced by Dushan and began
a war against Serbia. He was defeated and lost
some of his Jugoslav possessions, including Bos-
nia, inhabited by Croats. Dushan, however, did
not aim to consolidate all the Jugoslavs under his

I

JUGOSLAVIA 37

scepter. His eyes were on Constantinople. In
1356 he captured Adrianople. But lie died before
his armies reached the Byzantine capital. His
vast kingdom immediately crumbled. Bosnia
soon reverted to Louis the Great, who sought to
win her favor by bestowing the royal title on her
Ban, or chief. After the death of Louis the Great,
Bosnia attained complete independence and a
powerful position under Stephen Tvrtko, who
styled himself "King of the Serbs and of Bosnia
and the Coastland."

JVIeanwhile a terrible foe appeared in the east.
The Turks had invaded Europe. A Serbian army
which went out to meet them was defeated in
1371. The Turks continued their conquests of the
Balkans, capturing Nish in 1386, and exacting an
indemnity from the Serbian Tsar. The menace
of the Ottoman hordes did not, however, cause the
Christian states to abandon their own quarrels
and present a united front to the Moslem hosts.
Even Tvrtko of Bosnia did not realize in time the
meaning of the Turkish danger, and continued his
favorite policy of consolidating all the Jugoslav
dominions in the north until it was too late.

The Turks were ready for a tremendous drive
into Europe. The Serbs were at the gate of Cen-
tral Europe and against them the Ottoman Sultan,
Murat, directed his vast armies. The crisis came
in 1389. The Serbian Tsar, Lazar, realized the
acute situation and made a desperate appeal to

38 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

all the Jugoslav chiefs and princes to come to his
support. King Tvrtko, of Bosnia, was among
those who heeded the call of Serbia. On the plain
of Kosovo, the ' ' Field of Blackbirds, ' ' the two con-
tending forces met. On one side were the hordes
of Moslems; on the other, the Jugoslav kings,
chiefs, nobles and soldiers. Here was fought, on
June 15th, 1389, one of the bloodiest battles in his-
tory. Tsar Lazar and the flower of Serbian man-
hood went down in the contest. The Turkish Sul-
tan Murat was also slain on the battlefield. But
the victory was Turkish and Serbia was crushed
and her independence slowly extinguished. How
important the Battle of Kosovo was considered
by the Western world can be seen from the fact
that its issue was awaited impatiently in Paris.
The records of the Church of Notre Dame show
that a false report reached Paris of Serbian vic-
tory, and a solemn Te Deum was sung on the oc-
casion.

The downfall of Serbia was followed by the
collapse of the other Jugoslav state — Bosnia.
King Tvrtko died in 1391, after gaining possession
of the Dalmatian coast from Cattaro to Zara.
Soon after his death the Republic of Venice, then
a great maritime power, sought to establish itself j
in Dalmatia. By 1420 practically the entire Dal-
matian coast, excepting the small Republic of Ra-
gusa, had passed into the possession of Venice. In
1440 the Turks subjugated Bosnia. In 1459 Mo-

JUGOSLAVIA 39

hammed II destroyed the last remnants of Serbian
independence, in 1463 he completely crushed Bos-
nia, and in 1476 Herzegovina. These Jugoslav
lands remained under Turkish rule for three cen-
turies. Only two little principalities retained their
independence. One was impregnable Montenegro,
the embodiment of the fighting spirit of the race.
The other was the Republic of Eagusa (Dubrov-
nik), which continued to exist till the days of Na-
poleon as a cultural center, in which Jugoslav
civilization attained its greatest heights.

In the latter part of the fifteenth century large
numbers of Serbians migrated to South Hungary,
to escape the Turkish oppression. According to
a statement made by King Matthias of Hungary
in a letter to the Pope, in 1483, about two hundred
thousand Serbians had immigrated to his country
in the preceding four years. The Turks were now
menacing Hungary. In 1526 they were met by
Louis II, at the head of a Hungarian army. So
sure was he of victory over the invaders that he
did not desire his dominion, Croatia, to share in
the glory of the battle. The Turks, however, were
the victors. King Louis was slain, his army anni-
hilated, his country invaded. On January 1, 1527,
the Croatian diet elected Archduke Ferdinand of
Austria, of the Habsburgs, to the Croatian throne.
Ferdinand had been elected previously to the Bo-
hemian and Hungarian thrones, thus founding the
Habsburg empire.

40 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

In the course of the sixteenth century the Turks
penetrated into Croatian territory, after conquer-
ing even those South Hungarian provinces which
were populated by Serbian immigrants. But while
in Bulgaria and Bosnia they impressed themselves
deeply on the national character, in Serbo-Croatian
territory they left no strong marks. In the second
half of the seventeenth century the Western Euro-
pean Powers allied themselves to stem the ad-
vance of the Turks and push them back. Begin-
ning with 1683, when the Turks besieged Vienna,
the tide turned for the Moslems. It was John So-
bieski of Poland who sealed the fate of the Turks
by his timely aid. Since then the Turkish wave has
been receding toward Asia. Austria was saved
and Hungary freed from the invaders in 1683.
The Habsburgs, in their subsequent campaigns
against the Turks, appealed to the Serbians of
South Hungary to rise against the Ottoman gov-
ernment. The Serbians met in a national assembly
and demanded in return that Austria recognize
the autonomy of their church, headed by their
Patriarch. Emperor Leopold I accepted the Ser-
bian conditions. The rights thus granted to the
Serbians were proclaimed by the Austrian court
on August 31st, 1690, and assured to them religious
and national autonomy. Thanks to the Jesuit in-
fluences at Vienna these pledges were never fully
carried into effect. In the early years of the
eighteenth century the Magyars revolted, under

JUGOSLAVIA 41

Rakoczy II, against Austrian domination. The
Serbians of South Hungary were invited to join
the rebellion, but remained loyal to the Habsburgs.
They lost about 100,000 men in their struggle
against the Magyars, and materially assisted the
Habsburgs to maintain their position. Although
this brought forth, in 1706 and in subsequent
years, confirmations by Austria of the Serbians'
autonomous rights, these were not realized. In
1735 the Serbs revolted, but were promptly sup-
pressed and their rights limited even further.

The result of this was an extensive emigration
of Serbians from South Hungary. In 1751-53
many thousands of them left the Habsburg do-
minions. The Austrian government sought to
stop this movement by creating, in 1752, a commis-
sion for the protection of Serbian interests in
Austria, which was abolished twenty-five years
later. Toward the end of the eighteenth century
the Austrian Emperor, Joseph 11, inaugurated a
policy of centralization, which aroused Hungary's
bitter opposition. The latter was encouraged by
Austria 's reverses in 1790 to insist on guarantees
of Magyar national rights, demanding the sup-
pression of the national privileges of the Serbians
living in South Hungary. The Habsburgs pro-
ceeded to crystallize Serbian sentiment against
the Magyars, using it as a weapon against them.

While this struggle of the Serbs — the Orthodox
Jugoslavs — went on from generation to genera-

42 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

tioii, their Catholic brethren — the Croats — had
grown ahnost barren of national feeling in the
course of their domination by the Catholic Mag-
yars. It can thus be seen that it was the Greek
Orthodox Church that kept alive Serbian national-
ism. However, with the nineteenth century, a new
era dawned upon the Jugoslav people. In 1805 the
Croatians began to manifest organized opposition
to the Hungarians who sought to Magyarize the
country. This national feeling among the Jugo-
slavs gained tremendous impetus with the rise
of Napoleon, who shook the Austrian empire to
its foundations. He conquered Dalmatia, which
had come into the possession of Austria after the
fall of the Venetian Republic in 1797, and joined
it with part of Croatia, and Istria, Goritzia, Car-
inthia and Carniola under the name of the King-
dom of lUyria. "This kingdom of Illyria was the
first purely Southern Slav state since the ninth
century," writes Vladislav R. Savic, "in which
all three branches of the race — Serbs, Croats and
Slovenes — w^ere united under one administration. ' '
Napoleon added to Illyria the Republic of Ragusa
in 1808. His genius perceived clearly the vital im-
port of the land of the Jugoslavs. "Illyria is the
guard set before the gates of Vienna," he said.

There followed a brief but intensely productive
period of life for the Southern Slavs. "Under
the enlightened, if despotic, rule of Marshal Mar-
mont," observes R. W. Seton- Watson, "the long

JUGOSLAVIA 43

stagnation of the Middle Ages was replaced by-
feverish activity in every branch of life. Admin-
istration and justice were reorganized, the Code
Napoleon superseding the etf ete mediaeval codes ;
schools, primary and secondary, commercial and
agricultural, sprang up in every direction: the
first Croat and Slovene newspapers appeared:
the old Guild System was reformed and commer-
cial restrictions removed; peasant proprietary
was introduced; reafforestation was begun, and
splendid roads were constructed which are still
the admiration of every tourist. Official business
was conducted in French and Croatian, with the
addition of Italian along the coast."

In 1804 Serbia, still under Turkish domination,
made an attempt to liberate itself under the leader-
ship of Karageorge. The Serbs were joined by
thousands of their brethren from Austria and
Hungary, and for several years fought the Turks
successfully. In 1813 the Serbian insurrection
was crushed, but came to life again two years
later, and wrested from the Ottoman government
recognition of an autonomous principality formed
of a part of the Old Serbia. In the same year the
Kingdom of Illyria came to grief, but with the
downfall of Napoleon his ideas of Jugoslav unity
did not die out, and an Illyrian movement came
into existence. Its originator and leader was
Ljudevit Gaj, and he played a great role in arous-
ing Jugoslav nationalism. He adapted the Croa-

44 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

tian dialect to the Serbian, thus creating a common
literary tongue for the larger part of the Jugo-
slav people.

The rise of Magyar nationalism under the
Habsburgs made the lot of the Croats and Serbs
doubly oppressive. In 1825 the Magyars were al-
lowed to convoke their diet, which formulated a
policy of Magyarization for Hungary, without
regard to the national rights of Croatia and Sla-
vonia. To the Magyar nationahsts the Croats de-
clared: '*We are resolved not to degenerate from
our fathers and will preserve our nationality at
all costs and with every possible means. Our
rights of local government can never be the sub-
ject of negotiations, our internal administration
is not within the jurisdiction of the estates of
Hungary, and we protest most solemnly against
all innovations." But the Magyars, while con-
tinuously struggling to obtain recognition of their
autonomy from the Habsburgs, encroached upon
the Slavs that inhabited Greater Hungary, impos-
ing upon them the Magyar tongue and even inter-
fering with the Serbian Church.

The great revolutionary year of 1848 stirred
the Serbs of Hungary profoundly. They formu-
lated a series of demands and delegated several
leaders to present them to the Magyars. In April
the deputation had an audience with Kossuth, the
great Magyar statesman. It was an historic audi-
ence. The Serbs, led by Alexander Kostic, claimed

JUGOSLAVIA 45

their right to be regarded as a nation. What fol-
lowed is thus set down by E. W. Seton- Watson :

"What do you understand by a 'nation'?" in-
quired Kossuth.

^*A race which possesses its own language, cus-
toms and culture," was the Serb reply, "and
enough self -consciousness to preserve them."

"A nation must also have its own government,"
objected Kossuth.

"We do not go so far," Kostic explained; "one
nation can live under several different govern-
ments, and again several nations can form a single
state."

When one of the younger members of the depu-
tation, in reply to a statement by Kossuth that
Hungary must be Magyarized, said that the Serbs
would be compelled to seek justice elsewhere, the
deputation was dismissed with the striking phrase :
"The sword must decide." These words of Kos-
suth were the signal for a bitter racial struggle,
which developed in 1848. The Serbians of South-
ern Hungary, who were Orthodox, and the Catho-
lic Croats now forgot all their religious differ-
ences and united in one cause. In June the
Croatian diet arrived at an agreement with the
Serbian assembly which met at Karlovci and
which had demanded the creation of a separate
principality embracing the South Hungarian prov-
inces of Syrmia, Baranya, Backa and the Banat.
This rapprochement between the two Jugoslav

4G THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

sections of opposite religious faith was a great
national triumph. It showed that the idea of Jugo-
slav unity was making big progress.

The Magyar movement became a menace to the
Habsburgs. Vienna therefore decided to make
use of the Serbo-Croats in order to subdue the
Magyars. To win the favor of the Jugoslavs the
Austrian rulers granted them reforms and ap-
pointed Baron Jelacic to the office of Ban of
Croatia, allowing him to command an army against
the Magyars. The latter, however, repulsed the
Jelacic force, and soon afterwards launched their
famous revolutionary movement of 1848-49. The
first victims of the Magyar revolution were the
Serbs of South Hungary. The Habsburgs be-
came uneasy and hastened to desert Croatia and
Slavonia and conciliate the Magyars. Jelacic,
having served his purpose as commander of
the Serbo-Croatian forces, which helped Aus-
tria in the war that had meanwhile been
declared by Italy, was now deprived of his
offices as Ban and General. But it was too
late for the Habsburgs to escape the Mag-
yar wrath. The revolution had gained much mo-
mentum. The Magyars attacked the Serbs and i
Croats and forced a union between the latter and |
the Austrians. The Habsburgs again favored the
Jugoslavs with reforms and privileges. A Serbian
principality was created in South Hungary after

JUGOSLAVIA 47

the Magyar revolution had been bloodily sup-
pressed.

Beginning with 1849 Austria was in the grip of
a reactionary wave. The Serbian principality
was virtually abolished when the Emperor had
assumed the title of its chief. Germanization
became the leading policy of the Habsburg rule.
This policy exploded in 1859, when Austria suf-
fered a defeat at the hands of Italy and found it
necessary to strengthen the empire by winning
the support of the subject nationalities. But no
definite plan was elaborated and followed by the
Vienna government for several j^ears. It was
only in 1867, after the disastrous war of the
preceding year against Prussia, that Emperor
Francis Joseph embarked upon the definite but
fatal system of Dualism. By the famous agree-
ment of February, 1867, the Magyars were raised
to the position of a sovereign nation, and Aus-
tria-Hungary was created. It was fatal because
the Slavic races, the Poles, Ruthenes, Czechs and
Serbo-Croats, were not admitted into the union.
The two dominant peoples in the empire were the
Germans and the Magyars, and thus was the stage
set for the explosion that occurred half a century
afterward. The Magyars, having gained ascen-
dancy, proceeded to conciliate Croatia, and an
agreement was reached with her in 1868 which,
although restricting Croatian autonomy and ter-
ritory, still allowed her self-government.

48 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Meanwhile Serbia was gradually emerging from
Turkish domination and developing into an in-
dependent state. In 1815, after the failure of
Karageorge's insurrection, Milos Obrenovic, an-
other Serbian leader, raised the banner of rebel-
lion and succeeded in becoming the ruler of Serbia
under the Ottoman aegis. The Sultan's govern-
ment was conciliated when Karageorge was slain
by the party of Obrenovic and his head sent to the
Sublime Porte. This bloody deed of treachery
marked the beginning of the bitter dynastic feud
between the families of the two chiefs. Milos,
however, was recognized by Turkey as the Prince
of Serbia only in 1830. Although a despot by
nature, he was compelled to grant a constitution
with a national assembly in 1835. Thanks to the
interference of foreign powers, especially Russia,
in Serbian affairs, Milos abdicated and went into
exile in 1839. He was succeeded by his son
Michael, who was also forced to become an exile
because of foreign intrigue. The next ruler of
Serbia was a son of the slain Karageorge, Alex-
ander. He was deposed in 1858 by the assembly
because of his anti-Russian policy, and the old
Milos, still alive and in exile, was recalled. He
died in 1860, to be succeeded again by his son
Michael. He introduced many refomis and re-
modeled the Constitution, and succeeded, with the
aid of the great powers, in having the Turkish gar-
risons withdrawn from his domain. On May 6th,

JUGOSLAVIA 49

1867, Serbian soil was clear of the Turk. Prince
Michael looked ahead to the time when all the
Jugoslavs would be united and slowly worked
for the consummation of this aim. But in June,

1868, he was assassinated by followers of the
Karageorge dynasty. After a regency, his cousin
Milan, aged fourteen at his death, became the
ruler of Serbia. During his rule Bosnia and
Herzegovina, populated by Serbo-Croats, but
dominated by Moslem nobles, revolted against the
Turkish government. At the end of a year of hesi-
tation and vacillation Prince Milan, together with
Montenegro, declared, in 1876, war on the Turks
in support of the Jugoslavs of Bosnia and Herze-
govina, promulgating a manifesto which called for
the union of the Southern Slavs in one gi'eat Ser-
bian state.

It was at this juncture that the policy which
reached its culminating point in July, 1914, was
inaugurated by the Habsburgs. Austria and
Hungary considered Serbia's aspiration to Bosnia
and Herzegovina a menace to themselves. Thanks
to Eussia's intervention in 1877, Turkey was
beaten. But Serbia did not get much satisfaction
either from Russia or from Austria-Hungary at
the Congress of Berlin. Great Britain had rec-
ognized secretly Austria-Hungary's title to Bosnia
on June 6th, 1878. Russia was too much interested
in Bulgaria and other things to justify the Serbian
hopes. The result was that, although Serbia and

50 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

Montenegro were augmented by the addition of
some territory to each, Bosnia and Herzegovina
were placed by the Congress of Berlin under
Austro-Hungarian control, which took the form
of the occupation of the two provinces, still nomi-
nally Turkish, by Austrian authorities. For a
time Serbia was torn between hatred for Russia
and Austria-Hungary. The latter knew how to
utilize this condition. It encouraged Prince Milan
to assume the royal title, which he did, but the
Serbian kingdom under him was greatly dis-
credited. He wrecked the larger Jugoslav aims by
falling upon Bulgaria and waging a war which
ended disastrously for Serbia. He finally gained
the enmity of his people to such an extent that
he found himself constrained to abdicate in 1889
in favor of his son Alexander, who was a minor.
A regency took over the supreme power. King
Alexander was an arbitrary and capricious ruler
and set up practically the entire nation against
him by marrying a former mistress of his. After
a reign of immoral conduct and general provoca-
tion. King Alexander and his wife were assassi-
nated during the night of June 10th, 1903, by a
group of officers. A grandson of Karageorge,
Peter, was now elected to the Sei|)ian throne and
instituted an exemplary constitutional govern-
ment.

During the latter part of King Milan's life and
the disgraceful reign of his son, Alexander, Croa-

JUGOSLAVIA 51

tia was smarting under an oppressive Magyar
yoke. After tlie Bosnian rebellion of 1876 the re-
lations between the Magyars and Groats again be-
came acute. The Groats wanted Bosnia joined
to Croatia under Habsburg rule; the Magyars
sought to add it to Hungary. Premier Tisza, of
Hungary, suspended temporarily the Croatian
constitution in 1883, when the Groats made an ef-
fort to revolt, and appointed as Ban of Croatia
his own cousin. Count Khuen-Hedervary, whose
twenty years' rule formed, according to R. W.
Seton-Watson, "a most humiliating epoch in
Southern Slav history. . . . He was probably
the most effectively corrupt satrap of a subject
province whom the nineteenth century has pro-
duced, wiiile in 1910, as Hungarian Premier, he
organized electoral corruption on a scale hither-
to unsurpassed, not merely in Hungary, but prob-
ably in modern Europe. . . . Above all, Khuen's
system depended upon playing off Croat and Serb
against each other, upon inflaming the petty pas-
sions and religious bigotry of Catholic and Ortho-
dox."

In 1905, when Austria, under -the influence of
the Russian Revolution, was compelled to grant
universal suffrage, the Serbo-Croats found their
opportunity. They formed a coalition, both in
Croatia and Dalmatia, and triumphed in 1906, is-
suing a series of demands for reforms and lib-
erties. After that developments followed quickly.

52 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Serbia and Montenegro became the centers of
active agitation for Jugoslav unity. The revolu-
tionary elements in Croatia, Dalmatia and Sla-
vonia were even more intensely at work on the
propagation of the Jugoslav national idea. The
Austrians and the Magyars by their policy of per-
secution and intolerance helped the spread of the
movement. The Habsburg government did not
stop at forgery in order to be able to throw accu-
sations at both its own Jugoslav subjects and the
Serbian government. Austria-Hungary decided
to formally annex Bosnia-Herzegovina, and con-
sidered it necessary to make out a strong case by
proving that the Serbian king and his counselors
were plotting together with the Croats against
the Vienna government. A number of documents
were forged to back up the accusations and were
sufficient to justify Austria in annexing Bosnia-
Herzegovina. This provoked the great crisis of
1908, when a world war seemed inevitable, as the
Russian government considered Austria-Hun-
gary's act a slap in the face. However, when
Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany openly placed him-
self on the side of Austria, Russia backed out,
suffering diplomatic humiliation. The two prov-
inces remained Austrian, although in the sensa-
tional trial that followed the documents produced
by the Austrian government against Serbia were
proven forgeries. Professor Masaryk, the Czecho-
slovak leader, was able to demonstrate later that

JUGOSLAVIA 53

the documents were concocted by Count Forgach,
the Austro-Hungarian minister to Serbia.

These methods of the Vienna politicians only-
solidified the Jugoslav national sentiment. In
1912, during the war of the Balkan League against
Turkey, the Serbs amazed the world by their high
military ability. Serbia, it has been said, avenged
Kosovo in that year and revealed a spirit that
caught the entire Southern Slav race in a wave of
enthusiasm. Serbia's achievements gave a greater
impetus to Jugoslav nationalism than generations
of literary and political propaganda. Naturally,
Austria-Hungary became uneasy at the sudden
manifestation of Serbian power and proceeded to
repress Jugoslav activities within its domains,
simultaneously plotting to disrupt the Balkan
League and set Bulgaria against Serbia. This
Vienna accomplished. The second Balkan war
robbed the Serbs of access to the sea and embit-
tered further their attitude toward Austria-Hun-
gary.

In 1914, then, the Jugoslav movement had
reached its highest mark. Russia had since 1908
made great strides in the reorganization of her
army. Austria-Hungary was in a mood to crush
the Southern Slav menace, the sponsor of which
was Serbia in the eyes of Vienna. Serbia, how-
ever embittered, cannot be said to have been
physically fit for an arduous war after the two
wars of 1912 and 1913, which had fairly exhausted

54 THE KESUKRECTED NxVTIONS

her. Still the inflammatory material was there.
(xerman-Magyar nationalism had in the course of
a century cultivated Jugoslav nationalism by op-
pression and persecution. Now it blossomed forth
and was desperate enough to fight for its national
riglits. The clash might have been postponed for
a time, but it could hardly have been avoided. The
signal was given when Archduke Francis Ferdi-
nand of Austria-Hungary was assassinated at
Sarajevo, Bosnia, by a youth named Princip. The
full story of the criminal act has not yet been re-
vealed. It has been charged, not without some
reason, that the assassin was a protege of certain
Austro-Hungarian politicians. At least it is now
established that the murdered archduke was in-
clined toward a radical solution of the Jugoslav
problem, and that he had even favored the recon-
struction of the Dual Monarchy on a federal basis.
He was pronouncedly anti-Magyar, that is certain,
and it is this that adds an element of mystery to
the assassination. What followed is but too well
known. Vienna took Serbia to task, holding her
government responsible for the assassination and
the revolutionary movement in the Austro-Hun-
garian Jugoslav provinces. The famous ulti-
matum w^as despatched to Serbia, plainly aiming
at the destruction of Serbian sovereignty. That
Serbia wTnt as far as it could possibly have been
expected from a sovereign nation in her reply to
Vienna is clearly written in the records of the

JUGOSLAVIA 55

Great War. Jugoslav nationalism was opposed by
German and Magyar nationalism, and only by the
self-negation of one party could a collision have
been averted. But that would have been a nega-
tion of the very soul and purpose of the power that
is modern nationalism.

What happened to the Croats, Serbs and Slo-
venes within the boundaries of the Dual Mon-
archy after the outbreak of the World War re-
mains of the least known pages of atrocities and
persecutions recorded in Europe and the Near
East between 1914 and 1918. Perhaps it was be-
cause public opinion considered the Jugoslavs
.partly responsible for the universal conflict that
little attention was paid to their condition. Ac-
cording to a speech delivered on October 19th,
1917, in the Austrian Parliament by a noted Croat
poet and politician, who had himself been im-
prisoned during the early part of the war, the
Jugoslavs suffered hideous persecution.

* ' Upon the outbreak of the war a veritable tem-
pest of destruction was let loose upon all Jugo-
slav patriots. . . . All the nationally enlight-
ened, responsible and honest elements of the male
population were arrested, interned, imprisoned,
ruined, condemned to death, executed; the very
young and the aged were fated to die of hunger,
the remainder were terrorized, demoralized and
dishonored. . . .

"When, after three months' imprisonment at

56 THE RESUERECTED NATIONS

Maribor (Marburg), I was for the first time
brought before a judge, he said to me: 'I do
not know what the accusation is against you, and
this you will readily understand when I tell you
that in Dalmatia, Istria and Carniola alone we
have arrested more than five thousand persons.'
You can now imagine how many have been ar-
rested in Bosnia, in Herzegovina, in Slavonia and
in the south of Hungary ! ' '

The executions and atrocities to which the Jugo-
slavs were subjected only further exasperated
them and consolidated their national conscious-
ness. A Jugoslav committee was formed abroad,
aiming at the constitution of all the Jugoslav
provinces of Austria-Hungary into a separate
state, preferably in union with Serbia and Mon-
tenegro. Serbia now openly espoused the cause
of Jugoslav unity. On July 20th, 1917, the Serbian
government and the Jugoslavs of Austria-Hun-
gary arrived at a formal agreement, known as
the Declaration of Corfu. It expressed the aspi-
rations of all the Jugoslav peoples to become one
nation. Specifically, it provided that the future
Jugoslavia should be a kingdom under the rule of
the Serbian dynasty, while leaving to an all-Jugo-
slav constituent assembly to promulgate a consti-
tution as "the beginning and end of all author-
ity." When Austria-Hungary collapsed and the
Jugoslavs suddenly found themselves the masters
of their destinies, the republican sentiments of the

JUGOSLAVIA 57

former Austro-Hungarian subjects asserted them-
selves and they sought to make the united Jugo-
slavia a republic. Friction thus developed be-
tween the two parties to the declaration of Corfu.
''The difference between the two views," said
Dr. Hinko Hinkovic, one of the signators of the
pact and a recognized leader of the Croats, ''may
be shortly defined as the scheme of Greater Serbia
and Jugoslavia. According to Mr. Pasic, the
Serbian Premier, the Jugoslavs outside of Serbia
ought to enter this kingdom. Meanwhile the
overwhelming majority of our nation most ener-
getically refuses any idea of a Greater Serbia, as
well as of a Greater Croatia. What we desire is
to establish a new state which all parts of the
nation should enter on absolutely equal terms, re-
serving to the constituent assembly the sovereign
decision of the whole constitution, including, of
course, the question of a republic or a monarchy."
Another element of friction was introduced by
Montenegro, whose king, Nicholas, was declared
deposed by the partisans of the idea of a Greater
Serbia. The king, who is a most enlightened
man, persisted in clinging to the throne, seeing
no reason why he should abdicate in favor of
King Peter of Serbia. In a proclamation which he
issued in November, 1918, he said: "I solemnly
declare that my dear Montenegro should become
a constituent part of Jugoslavia, and enter in the
Jugoslav community frankly and honestly, as it

58 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

has struggled and suffered for it. I desire that
we unite ourselves as brothers in a confederate
Jugoslavia in which each state will retain its
rights, institutions, religion and customs and in
which no one will dare pretend to supremacy, but
where all will be equal."

In December, 1918, the representatives of Croa-
tia, Dalmatia, Slavonia, and other parts of the
fallen Dual Monarchy, arrived at an understand-
ing with the Serbian government and entered an
all-national provisional ministry. However, that
was not a final solution of the internal problems
confronting the new state. Before Jugoslavia is
solidly established it would-be necessary to recon-
cile the republicanism of the Austro-IIungarian
Jugoslavs with the imperialistic aspirations of
the Serbian dynasty ; and the differences between
the Serbian and Montenegrin monarchies would
have to be composed. Jugoslavia might become
one nation governed on a federal basis, being in
effect a United States of Jugoslavia; national
unity might be achieved under the scepter of the
Karageorge house of Serbia. The outcome will,
to a very large extent, depend on the solution of
the external problems facing Jugoslavia.

By far the most important of these is the con-
flict between the territorial aims of the Italian
government and the national rights of Jugoslavia.
By the secret treaty concluded in London on
April 26th, 1915, between Italy on one side and

JUGOSLAVIA 59

Great Britain, France and Eussia on the other,
the former was to receive in reward for her
entrance into the war on the side of the Allies,
among other things, the city of Trieste and its sur-
roundings; the provinces of Goritzia and Gra-
disko ; the whole of Istria and a number of islands
in the vicinity; the province of Dalmatia and all
the neighboring islands. The Adriatic is virtually
turned into an Italian lake, and Jugoslavia is de-
prived of much territory inhabited by Slavs.
Italy's claim to Dalmatia is based on its conquest
and possession by the Venetian Republic for sev-
eral centuries, as well as her need of harbors. Sir
Arthur Evans, a Britisher with an intimate knowl-
edge of the Adriatic problem, wrote in April,
1917, long before the publication of the secret
treaty and the crumbling of Russia under the
Central Powers, with regard to the Italian claims,
as follows : '

"The legitimate need of Italy for protection
on her eastern maritime flank is well recognized
and must certainly outweigh any pedantic appli-
cation of the principle of nationality. No peace
could be satisfactory for her, nor indeed for the
Allies, that did not place in her hands not only
such purely Italian territories as the western strip
of Istria from Trieste to the Arsa — the territorial
boundary of Italy f rqm the days of Augustus on-
wards— but a series of key positions, including
not only Pola, but the island and city of Lussin,

60 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

on the other side of the Quarnero, and Lissa, the
key island of the Middle Adriatic, besides Valona
at its mouth. Let every legitimate security be
given her.

''But to endeavor to lay hold of Dalmatian or
Croat territory en masse, more especially any
mainland tract, would be, from the point of view
of the true Italian interests, little short of 'mid-
summer madness.' Having lived the better part
of seven years on those shores and possessing a
personal knowledge of the most out-of-the-way
districts of the Interior, I can claim an exceptional
right to speak on this question. Nearly 97 per
cent, of the population is Slav. Even the infini-
tesimal minority is not in the true sense of the
word Italian. The Province is the very focus of
South Slav nationalism. An attempt of this kind
would antagonize the whole Slavonic world and
could only be the prelude to a new War of Libera-
tion in the near future. Nay, more, it would do
much to prejudice the real heritage of Latin civi-
lization on the East Adriatic shores. ..."

The conflict between the Jugoslavs and the
Italian government assumed such bitterness that
the former even went as far as denying the right
of the latter to Trieste and Pola, basing their claim
on the fact that the territory lying behind these
ports is populated by Slavs. Ethnographically,
this is to a great extent true. Although the strip
of coast between Trieste and Pola, about twenty

JUGOSLAVIA 61

miles wide, is predominantly Italian, the hinter-
land is indubitably Slav. Still the Italian claims
here are generally conceded, because the two cities
contain Italian majorities. Not so with Fiume,
the outlet of Croatia and Slavonia. The majority
of its population is Italian. Its immediate hinter-
land, however, is Jugoslav. Although it is not a
natural port, an artificial harbor was built there
at a tremendous expense. It forms another bone
of contention which has already resulted in bloody
warfare between the Jugoslavs and the Italians
who, according to an account in The New Europe,
of London, crossed the line of demarcation laid
down in the armistice of October 31 and pressed on
as far as the very suburbs of Laibach, the Slovene
capital, following this movement up with a land-
ing at Fiume on November 17. This provoked the
Jugoslavs, and their National Council sent a note
to the Allies and the United States, which read, in
part, as follows :

'^ Though the Italians had assured the Serbian
Army in Fiume that they would not occupy the
town, they landed in the harbor as soon as the
Serbs had by agreement withdrawn from the town
area. The Italians occupied with military force all
public buildings and oflQces and the railway sta-
tion, and ignored the protests of the Entente rep-
resentatives who were present. Communication
by rail, post and telegraph between Fiume and
Zagreb (capital of Croatia) was interrupted by

62 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

the Italian military. . . . The Jugoslav National
Council repudiates all responsibility for the con-
sequences which may result from these intolerable
conditions."

Two days later the Council ordered the mobi-
lization of five classes from 1895 to 1899, while the
Serbian High Command despatched the Jugoslav
Legions to Laibach "for the express purpose of
defending the frontiers of the new state against
Italy. ' ' The arrival of American troops in Trieste
and Fiume averted immediate bloodshed.

Meanwhile differences had developed in the
Italian government. Minister Bissolati resigned
from the Cabinet as a protest against Italy's in-
sistence on the terms of the secret treaty of April,
1915, and was understood to have the support of
a large section of Italian public opinion. The
Jugoslav-Italian conflict reached such a degree
that M. R. Vesnitch, the Serbian Minister to
France, officially made the following striking state-
ment on January 4, 1919 :

' * Should the treaty secretly signed by England,
France, Russia and Italy in 1915, whereby Italy
was to come into possession of the eastern coast
of the Adriatic after the war, be confii-med by the
coming Peace Conference, then Serbia would fight
again, and fight to the finish. Serbia did not
enter this war to become the vassal of any nation.
She cannot agree to have Italy control the terri-
tory in question.

JUGOSLAVIA 33

''Serbia goes to the conference believing that
affairs will be directed there in accordance with
the public announcements of the great powers,
especially those of President Wilson. The posi-
tion of Serbia and the Jugoslavs would be des-
perate if their hopes did not rest in the principles
laid down by America. They would be desperate
because certain of the great Allied powers, while
announcing these principles, have entered into
opposing conventions and understandings. Some
of these understandings were directed against
Serbia.

' ' Serbia is the only nation in Europe which has
made no treaty of any kind with the Allies. She
has marched on from the first with justice as her
only weapon."

The statement contained in the last sentence is
challenged by the Montenegrin king, by Hungary
and by Albania. Sympathy for Jugoslav national-
ism on the part of the American people ought
not to blind them to its misdeeds. The machina-
tions which brought about the illegal deposal of
King Nicholas must be laid at the door of Serbia,
while the refusal of France to allow him to return
to Montenegro was the result of Jugoslav in-
fluences. As to South Hungary, where the Jugo-
slavs claim considerable territory, the principle
of self-determination by plebiscite advocated by
the Jugoslavs in their disputes with Italy should
be equally applied here.

64 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

As regards Albania, both Serbia and Monte-
negro are the sinners. Both have acquired Al-
banian territory. In the past this could have been
justified on the ground that the two little countries
needed access to the sea. But with the disruption
of Austria-Hungary and the creation of a united
Jugoslavia this need is eliminated. Still there ap-
pears to be no disposition on the part of the Jugo-
slavs to return to Albania what is hers by indis-
putable right, perhaps because the Albanian
people lack national cohesion and a strong national
consciousness, which renders them helpless for
the time being in the midst of the aggressive
Greeks and Jugoslavs, but whose interests cannot
be disregarded by those who, like President Wil-
son, seek to establish a relationship of amity and
sympathy ''among such states as those of the
Balkans," instead of "the coercion of force and
the guidance of intrigue" under which they la-
bored heretofore.

A united Jugoslavia, purged of all imperialism
and founded on justice, would be broad-hearted
enough to extend a brotherly hand to the free Bul-
garian people, who are Jugoslav by origin. The
Southern Slavs in the United States, according to
Joseph Goricar, one of their leaders, want to see
all the Jugoslavs, including the Bulgarians, united
in a federation comprising a population of more
than eighteen million. ' ' They want to unite with
Bulgaria, ' ' he adds, ' ' to get away from the ancient

JUGOSLAVIA 65

strife. They want a strong federal republic with
a common army and navy, a common diplomacy,
a republic in which each state will have the right
to its own religion and language and its own cul-
tural freedom. ' ' A Jugoslavia built on such foun-
dations would endure, and would prove a bulwark
of peace in Europe and a great force in civili-
zation.

in

ALBANIA

Many races have come and gone in Europe.
Mighty hordes from the East swept over it at
various times and vanished in the course of his-
tory. But of the few original inhabitants of
Europe, the true Europeans, there still remain the
Albanians, populating a mountainous section of
the Balkan Peninsula. The Albanians are the di-
rect descendants of the Blyrians who lived in the
south of Europe since the dawn of history.

Albania lies on the eastern coast of the Adri-
atic, where it is nearest to Italy, and is bounded
by Montenegro on the north, Serbia and the Mace-
donian Slavs on the east, and Greece on the south.
Albania's seacoast possesses splendid harbors,
that of Valona, the "Gibraltar of the Adriatic,"
being especially important. Albania is a rugged
country and its inhabitants are a rugged people.
They speak a language of their own. The total
number of Albanians is difficult to establish, as it
is not clearly defined yet where the Albanians
cease to predominate along their southern and
northeastern boundaries. The maximum estimate

66

ALBANIA 67

of Albania's population does not go beyond two
and a half million.

The geographical situation of Albania is largely
responsible for the history of jits inhabitants.
Driven into the mountain fastnesses by the waves
of Eastern invaders, the Albanians resisted all
efforts to assimilate them. Through centuries of
struggle they maintained their language and cus-
toms, though not their political independence. The
success with which the Albanians clung to their
traditions appears most remarkable when it is
considered that in the past three thousand years
Albania had been invaded and ruled by the armies
and authorities of ancient Greece, Rome, Byzan-
tium, Serbia, Bulgaria and Turkey. Albania's
history has really been one uninterrupted series
of epic fights for the preservation of its racial
characteristics, as observed by an Albanian publi-
cist.

With the arrival of the Turks in Europe, Al-
bania was, after a fierce struggle, subjected by
them and Mohammedanism was introduced into
the country. Early in the fifteenth century the
Turks, not quite sure yet of Albania's loyalty,
sought to restrain it by seizing the four sons of
the Albanian prince John Castriota as hostages.
The youngest of these boys, George, named by the
Turks Iskander Bey, and become known as Skan-
derbeg, was very gifted. He was educated at the
court of Sultan Murat II, and became a brilliant

68 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

military leader. In 1443 the Turks were badly-
beaten in a battle with Ladislaw II, King of Hun-
gary. The Albanian soul of Skanderbeg as-
serted itself and he resolved to return to his native
country and restore its independence. He was
received by his people with acclamation and named
their prince. Then began one of the most phe-
nomenal careers of the Middle Ages.

Skanderbeg first cleared his country of the
Turkish garrisons and began a struggle against
the Turks that is writ in the history of Europe in
letters of glory. Every Ottoman army that was
despatched against the Albanian chief was de-
feated in turn. He was appointed by Pope Pius
II as Commander in Chief of all the Christian
armies in Europe. In 1449, he disastrously beat
a Turkish force of 100,000, under the personal
command of Sultan Murat II, who was finally
forced to return to his country, humiliated. The
Sultan who succeeded Murat, Mohammed II, the
conqueror of Constantinople, was powerless
against the Albanians. Albania was invincible un-
der Skanderbeg, who incidentally saved Europe
from the ravages of the Asiatic invasion that
threatened it in the fifteenth century. Skanderbeg
died in 1467, "fighting the battle of European
Christendom and civilization against barbarism
and heathenism, ' ' according to the Reverend Noli,
an Albanian leader in the United States. Henry

ALBANIA 69

Wadsworth Longfellow sang as follows of Skan-
derbeg, in his ''Tales of a Wayside Inn":

Anon from the Castle walls

The Crescent Banner falls,

And the crowd beholds instead,

Like a portent in the sky,

Iskander's banner fly,

The Black Eagle with double head;

And a shout ascends on high,

For men's souls are tired of the Turks,

And their wicked ways and works.

That have made of At-Hissar

A city of the plague;

And the loud, exultant cry

That echoes wide and far

Is: ''Long live Skanderbeg!"

Skanderbeg was not the first great military
leader that Albania produced. As early as 1225
B. C, the Albanians had a fighting king named
Hyllus. Alexander the Great is thought by some
to have been Albanian. Pyrrhus, the greatest
soldier of his time, was an Albanian. Many of the
brilliant leaders of the armies of the various
Balkan peoples were of Albanian blood. What the
Albanians are is picturesquely shown by their na-
tive name. Shkipetars is what the Albanians call
themselves. "Shkipetar" means "So?i of the
Mountain Eagle."

After the death of Skanderbeg the Turks re-
sumed their efforts to dominate Albania. A con-
siderable emigration occurred as a result of the
Turkish policies. Large numbers of Albanians

70 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

migrated to Greece and South Italy, not wishing
to bear the foreign yoke. There are nearly half a
million Albanian descendants in Greece, who form
now the principal cause for the strained Greco-
Albanian relations. The Greeks claim these im-
migrants, inhabiting the so-called Northern
Epirus, as their own nationals, but the Albanians
insist that their brethren, in what they term
Southern Albania, have never been Hellenized and
that they still preserve their language and tra-
ditions.

Albania remained a part of the Turkish Empire
np to 1912. And yet not all the Albanians became
Mohammedans. A considerable minority belong
to the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches.
It is a significant reflection of the natural tolerance
of the Albanian that the divergence in faith did
not produce any internal strife. The Christians
and Moslems intermarried freely, and both sec-
tions of the race maintained their national tradi-
tions. The world, however, was allowed to get
mostly erroneous ideas about the Albanians. They
were represented by their oppressors as a savage
people, quarrelsome, barbaric, a race of brigands
and robbers. They appeared quite different to
close Western observers. Captain J. S. Barnes,
R.F.C., in a paper that he read before the British
Geographical Society said of the Albanians :

"The Albanian has many stirring qualities
which make for success. He is brave, frugal, gen-

ALBANIA 71

erous, independent, honest, as well as honorable,
industrious, intelligent, artistic, 'and faithfully
obedient to those whom he trusts and respects. If
he is ignorant, diffident, superstitious, obstinate,
conservative and lacking in self-control, these are
defects due to his environment rather than innate
in his character."

In 1878, at the Congress of Berlin, when Turkey
was trying to improve with the help of the West-
ern powers the terms which Eussia imposed upon
her at San Stefano as a result of the war of 1877,
Albania for the first time became an object of
aggrandizement in the European game for the bal-
ance of power. Albania was of course considered
as a portion of Turkey. The Congress carved
out the Albanian town and district of Dulcigno
and gave it to Montenegro. In the south the great
powers extended the frontiers of Greece to the
Eiver Kalama, which empties into the channel of
Corfu.

In both instances the partitioning of Albania
took place regardless of any ethnic considerations.
The leading Albanians suddenly realized that with
the impending collapse of the Turkish Empire,
Albania might cease to exist as a whole, even un-
der foreign control, and pass in slices into the
hands of several state;,. A national consciousness
was aroused in then] and took definite form in the
establishment of the Albanian League which
fiercely fought for the maintenance of Albania's

72 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

integrity. It was due to the determined protests
of the Albanians that the original provisions of
the Treaty of Berlin were not carried out fully in
the south. There was even an attempt at a gen-
eral rising among the Albanians, intended to
throw off the Ottoman shackles and make Albania
independent. However, the Turks were able to
nip the plot in the bud and even promised to allow
the Albanians an educational system of their own.
These promises were never carried out. Never-
theless, many Albanians educated themselves in
foreign schools, so as to be able to wage their
fight for independence more effectively, in which
they succeeded to a marked degree.

* ' The Albanian movement is a perfectly natural
one," wrote Lord Goschen, the British Ambassa-
dor at Constantinople, in July, 1880, to Lord Gran-
ville, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. ''An
ancient and distinctive race, as any by whom they
are surrounded, they have seen the nationality of
these races taken under the protection of various
European powers and gratified in their aspira-
tions for more independent existence. . . . They
see the Eastern Question being solved on the prin-
ciple of nationality and the Balkan Peninsula
being gradually divided among various races.
Meanwhile they see that they have not received
similar treatment. Their nationality is ignored
and territory inhabited by Albanians is handed
over in the north to Montenegrins, to satisfy Mon-

ALBANIA 73

tenegro, the protege of Eussia ; and in the south
to Greece, the protege of England and France.
Exchanges of territory are proposed, other diffi-
culties arise, but it is still at the expense of Al-
bania, and the Albanians are handed over to Slavs
and Greeks without reference to nationality. ..."

The Balkan War of 1912 placed Albania at the
mercy of its neighbors, and it became the bone of
contention of Serbia, Greece, Bulgaria and Mon-
tenegro. These four contemplated the full parti-
tion of Albania among themselves. The interests
of Austria and Italy conflicted with the strength-
ening of these Balkan states at the expense of
Albania, and they stepped in to urge the establish-
ment of an independent Albanian state. During
the winter of 1913, at the Conference of the Am-
bassadors of the Great Powers, held in London,
Albania's claims to recognition as a separate na-
tional entity desei^ing sovereign existence were
acknowledged and the decision was made to create
an Albanian state. However, when the question
of boundaries came up, the Serbs, Montenegrins
and Greeks displayed an imperialistic attitude that
carried with it bitter disillusionment to the Al-
banians, nearly a million of whom were torn away
from their country and divided among their neigh-
bors.

Although considerably reduced in size, Albania
started out on its career of independence. Prince
William of Wied, a relative of the Rumanian

74 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

queen, was appointed king of Albania. His rule
was stormy and brief. He had several unfavor-
able factors to contend with. First came the dis-
pute with Greece. The latter was ordered by the
powers to withdraw its troops from South Al-
bania, or Northern Epirus. She did so, but en-
couraged a movement among the so-called Epirots
to establish autonomy in the province. The Great
Powers failed to step in and settle the Albanian-
Greek conflict.

In addition to the difficulties with Greece, there
appeared on the scene the figure of Essad Pasha,
who placed himself in command of the Ottoman
forces in the town of Scutari which he surren-
dered to the Montenegrins, and started out to gain
the favor of the Balkan States in order to obtain
the leadership over Albania. Prince William of
Wied got little encouragement from abroad upon
his arrival in Albania. Had the powers that chose
him lent their support to him, he would have suc-
ceeded in introducing law and order into the coun-
try. But they seemed to have forgotten Albania,
and the result was that the Prince of Wied left
Albania in disgust on the eve of the Great War.

In 1915 Albania was occupied by the Austrians
and Bulgarians. The invaders set themselves to
persecuting the Albanians, requisitioning supplies
without consideration for the needs of the people
and treating the natives with cruelty. When the
Albanians protested in Vienna against the occu-

ALBANIA 75

pation of their country, on the ground of their
neutrality, they were answered by the forcible
induction of many Albanians into the armies of
the Central Powers. The Albanian colonies
abroad, notably that in the United States, where
there are fifty thousand Albanian immigrants,
realized that the fate of their motherland was
bound up with that of the Allied cause. They
organized an Albanian contingent, with the per-
mission of the British Government, to fight with
the Allied armies.

In 1917 an Italian force landed in Albania, and
occupied its southern half. The commander of
the Italian Army of Occupation, Lieutenant-Gen-
eral Ferrero, on June 3rd, 1917, proclaimed the
unity and independence of all Albania under the
aegis and protection of the King of Italy. This
proclamation caused a great sensation and much
dissatisfaction in Allied countries, as it was taken
to mean that Italy sought to annex Albania before
the Peace Conference had convened. The Al-
banians, however, greeted the Italian occupation
with enthusiasm, as Italy proclaimed her interest
in a united Albania. To that extent they preferred
unity under Italy rather than independence in one
half of their country with the other half dismem-
bered. That the Albanians would be satisfied with
nothing less than complete independence, within
their ethnical boundaries, may be seen from the
statement of the Albanian leader, Javer Bey Ghi-

76 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

nokastra, made in reply to General Fcrrero on the
occasion of the anniversary of Italy's proclama-
tion of Albanian autonomy. Thanking Italy in
the name of his people he expressed his hope that
the Albanian government would be set up soon,
and added, amidst a great popular ovation :

"The Albanians do not want a small Moslem
Albania, as some diplomats have planned in secret
understandings, revealed lately, but a united Al-
bania within her geographical, historical and racial
frontiers. No statesman can decently claim at the
next Peace Congress that our rights in the prov-
inces of Kosovo, Northeastern Albania, and Cha-
neria. South Albania, are less sacred than the
rights of France to Alsace-Lorraine."

The Albanians have made a special appeal to
the United States to take an interest in their coun-
try. Mehmet Konitza, delegate of the American
Pan- Albanian Federation "Vatra," writes:
"America has given her moral support to Albania
in years past by enabling her to have the only
free schools that were not a pretext of foreign

propaganda It is the unanimous desire

of the Albanians to turn to America for help and
ask her to send a commission for a period of five
years to give the country time to bring into action
all its organizing forces." The case for Albanian
independence was laid before President Wilson by
the Reverend Fan Noli on American Independence
Day, 1918.

ALBANIA 77

''I shall have one voice in the next Peace Con-
gress and I shall use that voice in behalf of Al-
bania," was the answer of President Wilson.

Albania's history and its ethnographical com-
pactness are such as to make its case for sovereign
existence perfectly legitimate. "Provided she is
secure in the frontiers which are her due — for
otherwise she runs the risk of being strangled at
birth," wrote Captain J. S. Barnes, "Albania has
no reason to despair of a prosperous, and even a
brilliant future. ... A strong, just and national
government should soon give Albania her birth-
right to civilization. The material is there,
strongly endowed ; the resources are there, beyond
doubt; she occupies an enviable geographical po-
sition with the making of good harbors on the
narrowest portion of one of the most important
waterways of the world ; she lies across the path
of what will one day be the quickest mail route
from London to Suez, via Brindisi, Vlore, Janina,
Kalabaka and the Piraeus.

"The extent of her mineral resources is doubt-
ful, beyond the rich bituminous deposits round
Selintsa. But her future is none the less prom-
ising. The cultivation of the vine, the olive, to-
bacco, wheat, maize, hemp, flax, cotton, rive, valo-
nia, the potato and fruits of every description,
including the mulberry for the rearing of silk-
worms, will form the staple industries, comple-
mented by the manufacture of milk products, to-

78 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

gether with sheep, horse and cattle rearing, affor-
estation and sea and lake fisheries. The list by
no means exhausts what might be profitably under-
taken for export. Poultry farming, bee farming
and the cultivation of the beetroot should be added
before compiling supplementary lists of minor
and by-products. The manufacture of silk, cotton,
wool, leather and tow would have at hand their
raw materials of high quality; and power would
be supplied by the control of the abundant rivers.
In addition, pottery, weaving, iron, silver and
leather work have a long history as local indus-
tries, which exploit the Albanians' delicate artis-
tic sense, and are capable of considerable develop-
ment. There are no grounds for pessimism in this
quarter. ' '

Grounds for pessimism, however, do exist in
other quarters. Albania, although perfectly en-
titled to exist and develop as a nation, has not
yet evolved a strong national consciousness, and
is therefore unable to resist the encroachments
of the Montenegrins, the Serbs, the Greeks and
the Italians. Montenegro and Serbia both sought
routes to the Adriatic through Albanian territory
before 1914. The former was in possession of
Dulcigno and strove to annex Scutari (Skodra).
The latter was given by the powers the freedom of
the port of Durazzo and the right to construct a
railroad from Serbia through Albania to that har-
bor. The two nations have, however, with the

ALBANIA 79

collapse of Austria-Hungary and the rise of a
united Jugoslavia, plenty of accessible routes to
the sea. There is therefore no longer any
economic need for the Serbo-Montenegrin en-
croachment upon Albania. Will they relinquish
the Albanian territories now in their hands and
the special privileges they had obtained there?
If not, what will happen a quarter of a century
hence when the Albanians develop sufficient
national cohesion and spirit to fight for their
rights ? Much more bitter is the struggle between
Albanians and Greeks over what the first call
Southern Albania and the second, Northern Epi-
rus. It is inhabited by Moslem and Greek Ortho-
dox Albanians who have, however, identified them-
selves to a large degree with modern Greek
civilization. Ethnically, then, there can be no
doubt as to the Albanian character of the region.
But culturally its inhabitants, the Epirots, have
much in common with the Greeks. The only abso-
lute means of ascertaining the desires of the Epi-
rots is to ask them, by means of a referendum,
held under neutral auspices, whether they prefer
to belong to Greece or to Albania. The leaders
of the latter, finding themselves outwitted by the
Greek statesmen, have appealed to Italy to cham-
pion their cause. Italy has a considerable Alba-
nian population. Besides, Italy has a very deep
interest in the strategically situated port of
Valona, at the entrance into the Adriatic, Now

80 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

the Italian government did not like Greece to get
too close to Valona and therefore sought the in-
corporation of the disputed Epirus territory in
Albania, in which she succeeded, although pro-
voking thereby the hostility of Greece. In Novem-
ber, 1914, Italy, then a neutral, occupied Valona.
In April, 1915, Italy concluded a secret treaty with
England, France and Russia in which the Allies
stipulated that to Serbia and Montenegro should
belong a strip of Albania's Adriatic littoral, ex-
tending as far south as the River Drin and includ-
ing the ports of Dulcigno and S. Giovanni di
Medua. The same clause provides that ''the port
of Durazzo can be assigned to the independent
Mohammedan state of Albania." Then come
Articles VI and VII, which read :

"Italy shall obtain in full ownership Valona,
the island of Saseno and territory of sufficient
extent to assure her against dangers of a military
kind — approximately between the River Vojussa
to the north and east, and the district of Shimar
to the south.

"Having obtained Trentino and Istria by Ar-
ticle IV, Dalmatia and the Adriatic Islands by
Article V, and also the Gulf of Valona, Italy
undertakes, in the event of a small autonomous
and neutralized state being formed in Albania,
not to oppose the possible desire of France, Great
Britain and Russia to partition the northern and
southern districts of Albania between Montenegro,

ALBANIA 81

Serbia and Greece. The southern coast of Alba-
nia, from the frontier of the Italian territory of
Valona to Gape Stilos, is to be neutralized.

' ' To Italy will be conceded the right of conduct-
ing the foreig-n relations of Albania; in any case
Italy will be bound to secure for Albania a terri-
tory sufficiently extensive to enable its frontiers
to join those of Greece and Serbia to the east of
the Lake of Ohrida."

It was on the strength of the above-quoted con-
tract that Italian forces occupied Albania in 1917,
although at the time the public was unaware of
the existing treaty. While there can be no justifi-
cation whatsoever for Italy's desire to make Al-
bania an Italian province, it must be recognized
that the port of Valona, because of its virtual
domination of the whole Adriatic, cannot be al-
lowed by the Italian government to pass into the
hands of another strong nation. What is the
solution? Give Valona to whom it rightfully be-
longs, to Albania, suggests Arnold J. Toynbee,
and guarantee its perpetual neutralization in
some such provisions:

" (a) Avlona (Valona) shall always remain part
of Albania.

f*(b) It shall never be fortified, either by Al-
bania herself or by any large political group with
a unified military organization, of which Albania
may at any time hereafter become a member. ' '

The Albanian problem is pregnant with danger-

82 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ous possibilities. It is even more complicated
than the Italian-Jugoslav dispute. Montenegro,
Serbia, Greece and Italy are involved in its diffi-
culties, and a failure to solve it fundamentally
would mean the rise of another menace to the
peace of Europe at some future date.

IV

UKEAINE

Before the Russian Revolution of 1917 the
world was practically ignorant of the existence
of the Ukrainian problem. Then, when Ukraine
dramatically entered the field of international
relations by separating from Russia and conclud-
ing its own peace with Germany, the world was
appalled at the tremendous size and enormously
vital geographical position of Ukraine. Who
were the inhabitants of Ukraine and how did they
come into possession of that fertile and rich coun-
try that cut Russia off from the Black Sea?

The fact is that the Ukrainians are not a race
distinct from the Russians in origin. The Ukrain-
ians are Russians. They have as much claim to
that title as the people whom we call Russians.
The latter, strictly speaking, are Great Russians.
The Ukrainians are Little Russians. The two
form nine-tenths of the Russian race proper. The
other tenth is made up of the White Russians,
lying between the Great Russians of the north
and the Little Russians of the south.

Ukraine means ' ' borderland. ' ' That name was

88

84 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

given to the southern territory by the inhabitants
of the northern, Muscovite, region. Had the Little
Russians developed historically along the lines
followed by the Great Russians, had they been
confined to Russia, Ukraine would comprehend
all of Little Russia. But a part of them came
under the domination of Austria-Hungary, and
there became known as Ruthenes, or Ruthenians.
Their bulk is to be found in Eastern Galicia. The
Little Russians are thus divided into two separate
groups, although in language, religion, customs
and early history they are one and the same peo-
ple.

The history of Russia does not begin with the
history of the Great Russians, but with that of the
Little Russians. The first Russian kingdom or
principality was established in Kiev, the capital
of what is now Little Russia. When Kiev was a
flourishing town, carrying on trade with the By-
zantine Empire, the north of Russia was still
undeveloped. Had no external forces interfered,
Russia would perhaps have developed its strength
in the south and eventually become dominated by
the Little Russians. However, the Mongol in-
vasions swept over the southern regions, driving
the independent chiefs into the marshy and for-
ested north. Kiev, the "Mother of Russian
Cities," as it is still known, was conquered, while
Moscow, in the heart of Great Russia, took over its
position.

UKRAINE 85

It has been said, and not without justness, that
had Kiev continued as the capital of all Russia,
the Ukrainian problem would never have arisen
and Little Russia would have considered itself
as integral a part of the country as Great Russia.
The difference in the language of the two groups
was only dialectic. However, Muscovy was from
the very beginning a highly centralized state, and
Little Russia was never permitted to share in its
councils and government. The result, of course,
was the estrangement of the latter from its north-
ern brother.

Christianity entered Russia through the south.
It was when Kiev was just rising that its Grand
Duke, Vladimir, joined the Greek Church, and
had all the inhabitants of Kiev baptized. After
that Christianity spread northward and pene-
trated into the vast country. Kiev is even now
a holy city to the religious Russians, and hundreds
of thousands of pilgrims flock to its sacred places
annually from every corner of Russia.

The Tartar invasions from the East drove many
Little Russians westward, and they settled in
Western Bukovina, Eastern Galicia and the sur-
rounding territory. It was here that the Little
Russians became known as Ruthenes in later years.
This dispersal of the race weakened it, while to
the northwest two great powers were developing,
Lithuania and Poland. The latter obtained con-
trol over Galicia in 1340, when the Polish king.

86 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Casimir the Great, established himself in Little
Russia upon the death of its duke, in 1339. Lith-
uania also coveted part of that southern land and
the two kingdoms finally divided it among them-
selves, Lithuania taking the eastern regions of
Little Russia. But Lithuania later became united
with Poland so that Little Russia, from the Car-
pathians to the Don, was incorporated with
Greater Poland.

Under the rule of Poland Ukraine was sub-
jected to considerable oppression. The Poles
sought to impose their Catholic faith upon the
Orthodox Little Russians. The Polish gentry suc-
ceeded in Polonizing the Little Russian gentry by
barring the latter from their diets unless they be-
came Roman Catholics. The Little Russians were
originally peasants. But the introduction of the
institution of serfdom in the northern countries
sent a whole stream of freemen and criminals to
the southern steppes of the borderland — Ukraine.
These adventurers formed the nucleus for the
Cossacks, who were freelances banded together by
the Polish government to combat the Tartar and
Turkish invaders. The Cossacks loved freedom,
and when the Polish and Lithuanian nobles ex-
tended their grip over Ukraine and sought to im-
pose serfdom on its inhabitants, a feeling of bitter
enmity developed between the Ukrainians and
their masters. As in many a similar case, relig-
ious persecution and economic oppression helped

UKRAINE 87

to mold a national consciousness in the Little
Russians, fostering first of all a spirit of revolt.

This rebellious spirit, although prevalent
throughout Ukraine, found its stronghold among
the independent Cossack communities living along
the lower Dnieper. A climax was reached in 1648,
when the Cossacks, led by their great hetman, Bog-
dan Khmelnitsky, raised the banner of insurrec-
tion. Khmelnitsky was a small Cossack land-
owner. He had been subjected to cruel ill-treat-
ment by a Polish noble. Unable to obtain redress
by law he centered his efforts on consolidating the
spirit of discontent among his brethren. With a
force of Cossacks and Tartars he started out
northward in 1648, annihilating all the Poles and
Polish Jews. A Polish leader, Potocki, made an
attempt to stop his march with a force of four
thousand. This contingent was wiped out, and a
week later another Polish army was disastrously
defeated by the rebels. The rising now assumed
vast proportions, hundreds of thousands of insur-
gent Ukrainians gathering about Khmelnitsky.
The path of the Ukrainian advance was marked
with unexampled bloodshed. Terrible atrocities
were committed; whole cities were wiped out, so
deep was the feeling of revenge in the Cossack
heart. Poland was fairly shaken. An enormous
army of a quarter of a million was finally re-
cruited by the Poles to stop the advancing war-

88 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

riors. The battle that ensued was a decisive vic-
tory for the Cossacks.

The Poles then offered terms to the Cossacks,
but they were rejected by Khmelnitsky. Under
the personal leadership of the king, the Poles con-
tinued desperately their efforts to subdue the ris-
ing. On the part of the Poles it was really a fight
for the "privileges of the nobles and for religious
intolerance," while the Cossacks fought for free-
dom. After many battles the latter were defeated
and peace was concluded, but not of long duration.
Hostilities were renewed and the Cossacks found
it necessary to transfer their allegiance to the Mus-
covite Tsar. Khmelnitsky sent an envoy to the
northern ruler offering Little Russia to him, as
an autonomous unit. The treaty of Pereyaslav,
concluded betwe^iii Ukraine and Russia in 1654,
stipulated that the former retain its separate or-
ganization under the afgis of Moscow.

.The Ukrainian governmental system, if it may
be described thus, was crudely republican. The
hetman was elected by a general assembly of the
Cossacks. This democratic institution was to be
perpetuated even under the Tsar's suzeranity,
according to the treaty. Perhaps if Khmelnitsky
had lived long enough to establish firmly the
proper relations with Moscow, Ukraine's auton-
omy might have proved more or less durable.
Unfortunately, Kkmelnitsky died in 1657, and
Russia began to encroach upon Ukraine's rights.

UKRAINE 89

with a view toward the complete fusion of Little
and Great Russia. By the peace of 1667, con-
cluded between Russia and Poland, the latter ob-
tained that part of Ukraine which adjoined it. Of
course, this section lost its autonomy quickly.
Eastern Ukraine, under Mazeppa, a bold hetman,
sought an alliance with Charles XII of Sweden,
in an effort to get rid of the oppressive Russian
rule. This was during the reign of Peter the
Great, who inflexibly pursued the policy of con-
solidation. In the celebrated Battle of Poltava,
1709, Sweden was disastrously beaten and Ma-
zeppa fled to Turkey. Ukrainian autonomy was
entirely abolished by Peter.

After his death the office of hetman was re-
stored, although considerably reduced in power,
and lasted till 1764. At the same time as
Ukraine's political institution was being demol-
ished, Russia initiated measures of repression
against the Ukrainian language. In 1680 it was
banned from ecclesiastical literature. In 1720 the
printing of Ukrainian books was prohibited, fol-
lowed by the suppression of Ukrainian schools.
According to one authority, there were in the
eighteenth century in the province of Tchernigov
alone 866 schools, while sixty years later none of
them remained in existence.

In 1772 and 1793-5, when Poland was parti-
tioned, those parts of Ukraine which belonged to
it were taken over by Russia, except Eastern Gali-

90 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

cia and part of Bukovina. These latter, known
as Rutlienia, went to Austria, disguised as Polish
territory. The modern Ukrainian problem dates
from this division and is really a double problem,
that of the Ukrainians in Russia and of the
Ukrainians in Galicia. In the first they were sub-
jected to an intense campaign of Russification,
while in the second they were controlled by the
Poles who desired to have them Polonized.

It was in Russian Ukraine that the ideas of
Ukrainian nationalism were first born, doubtless
because of the ruthless rule of Tsarism. It was
there that the Ukrainian language finally assumed
a literary form and found its champion and
prophet in Taras Shevchenko, Ukraine's national
poet. He was born a serf and raised as a serf,
so that if not for the efforts of his Russian
friends, he would have died a serf. He was per-
secuted by the Tsar's authorities and finally was
arrested and exiled. He became Ukraine's
national hero, and around his name centered the
Ukrainian movement for national revival. Even
as early as the first half of the nineteenth cen-
tury, there was already an organization in
Ukraine aiming to make it an independent unit
in a federation of Slavic states. When the revo-
lutionary movement in Russia assumed large pro-
portions, the Ukrainians were among its most
active promoters. It is remarked by an Ukrainian
publicist that while the Russian revolutionary or-

UKRAINE 91

ganizations were favoring the idea of a central
governmental power to be established on the ruins
of Tsardom, the Ukrainian revolutionists were
aiming at the reorganization of Russia on a fed-
eral basis. It is vital to note this difference.
Unfortunately it was overlooked when the two
elements struggled for the overthrow of the autoc-
racy, and became a stumbling-block after the revo-
lution.

Toward the middle of the nineteenth century
Austria initiated a new policy in Galicia. Previ-
ously it had supported the Poles in their persecu-
tions of the Ruthenians. In order to make trouble
for Russia and to curb the Poles it was found
necessary to encourage the Ukrainian national
movement. The Ukrainian nationalists, driven
from Russia, found a haven in Galicia. The
Ruthenians were even allowed to establish profes-
sorships in the University of Lemberg. It has
been said that the Teuton monarchies aimed at the
creation of a united autonomous Ukraine to
weaken Russia. A large literature was printed in
Galicia and circulated secretly in Russian Ukraine,
instigating rebellion and propagating Ukrainian
nationalism. Several Ukrainian revolutionary
parties were active in Russia in the first years of
the present century. The outbreak of 1905 gave
strong impetus to the Ukrainian movement. In
the autumn of that year thirty-four Ukrainian
periodicals were being published. In the mutiny

92 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

of the Russian Black Sea fleet of that year the
Ukrainians had the lion's share. There were
forty Ukrainian nationalist members in the first
Russian Duma. They demanded autonomy. The
subsequent Ukrainian representations in the Duma
upheld this demand, adding to it a demand for
the restoration to Ukraine of all the rights ac-
corded to it by the Treaty of Pereyaslav of 1654.

Simultaneously with the tribulations of Russian
Ukraine there was a stirring of forces in Austrian
Ukraine or Ruthenia, where the Poles dominated.
Speaking of the Ruthenes, Yaroslav Fedortchuk,
a native writer, says : ' ' Although since 1772 they
have been Austrian, they have, as a matter of fact,
remained under Polish 'patronage.' At first the
Austrian government limited the power which the
great Polish landowners exercised over their
Ukrainian serfs. During the revolution of 1848
the Austrian government sought, against the
Poles and the Hungarians, the support of the
Ukrainians, and promised them the division of
Galicia into two parts nationally distinct, the in-
troduction of teaching in the Ukrainian language
throughout their own schools, and finally the en-
franchisement of the peasants from a state of
serfdom. Having crushed the revolution the gov-
ernment abolished serfdom, but took no further
notice of the other Ukrainian claims."

In 1873 the Poles entered into a secret compact
\^4th the Austrian government, whereby their

UKRAINE 93

supremacy in Galicia was guaranteed. A Pole was
appointed to the cabinet, responsible to the Polish
deputies in parliament. This strengthened the
Polish repressive policy toward the Ruthenians.
Measures were promulgated by the Poles making
it difficult for the Ukrainians to erect higher
schools. Eastern Galicia, eighty per cent, of
whose population is Ruthenian, became the scene
of a fierce Polish-Ukrainian struggle, centering at
first around the Lemberg University, from which
the Poles tried to oust the Ukrainian professor-
ships. In 1900 the Ukrainian students struck and
left the University. The Austrian government
proposed the establishment of a separate Ukrain-
ian university if the Poles would consent, but the
Lemberg City Council refused such consent.

'* Following the Prussian methods of coloniza-
tion, ' ' writes Pedortchuk, ' ' the great Polish land-
lords, who owned land in the Ukrainian part of
Galicia, dare not sell their land to the Ukrainian
peasants. When they do, they are considered as
traitors and are boycotted by the Poles, the Polish
motto being: 'Not one foot of ground to the
Ukrainians.' The Ukrainian peasants, the prole-
tarians of the agricultural life, are obliged to work
for a miserable pittance Ukrainian ground, which
constitutes the domain of the Polish nobleman.
They are shamefully exploited, and in case of re-
sistance or boycott they are treated like bandits;

94 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

they are chained, flogged, brought barefoot to the
town prisons and finally sentenced. ' '

The conditions under which the Ukrainians
lived in Galicia finally culminated in a general
strike, in 1902, and which extended over all of
Eastern Galicia. This was preceded, in 1897, by
a conflict with the Poles which resulted in the
murder of eight Ukrainians and many wounded^
In 1900 two political parties were organized by
the Ukrainians in Galicia. They demanded tho
division of Galicia into two parts. Eastern and
Western, the former to be constituted as a sepa-
rate Ukrainian province. It was these parties who
were responsible for the strike of 1902 and for
the numerous subsequent demonstrations. The
revolutionary outbreaks in Russia in 1905 rever-
berated in Eastern Galicia and the Ukrainian
movement there gained in intensity just as the
Polish policy of suppression grew in severity.
The dramatic climax of the contest occurred in
1908 when the Polish governor of Galicia, Count
Potocki, was shot by Miroslav Sichinsky, a
Ukrainian student. The indictment of the assassin
recognized the fact that the shooting was the out-
come of the struggle of the Ukrainian peasants
against the Polish nobility, admitting that the slain
governor supported the Russian policy in Galicia.
In 1913 a semi-official Russian statement said that
a secret pact between the Polish leaders in Galicia
and the Russian Prime Minister Stolypin was in

UKRAINE 95

existence. This agreement apparently was the
result of the menace which the Ukrainian demo-
cratic movement constituted to both the Russian
autocracy and Polish aristocracy. Sichinsky later
escaped and made his way to the United States,
where he was admitted after the United States
government held his offense to have been a politi-
cal act.

The Great War brought Galicia into the inter-
national arena. The Russian armies occupied
Galicia in 1914 and immediately the Tsar's gov-
ernment instituted a campaign of Russification
there. The reactionary Russian Governor-Gen-
eral, Count Bobrinsky, issued a proclamation in
which he announced that he considered ' ' Lemberg,
in East Galicia, the real cradle of Great Russia,
since the original population was Russian," and
that he intended to reorganize the country on the
basis of Russian ideals. The Russian language
was immediately introduced and the Ukrainian
prohibited. Russian oflBcials were appointed and
the Ruthenian Uniate Church subjected to perse-
cution. The Ukrainian deputy Levitsky protested
in the Austrian parliament against the Russian
activities, while in the Russian Duma the same
methods were denounced by the radical members.
When the Russians were driven out of Galicia
and Russian Poland was occupied by the Central
Powers, the latter sought to win the support of
the Poles by setting up a reunited Poland under

96 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

their protection. The Ukrainians in Galicia were
alarmed at the prospect of being incorporated in
Poland and again raised their voices for auton-
omy.

The Russian Revolution quickly gave birth to a
Ukrainian national assembly, or Rada, which met
in Kiev. If the Ukrainian nationalists had de-
manded complete separation from Russia previous
to the revolution, it was due to the rule of Tsar-
ism. In a free Russia the Ukrainians expressed
themselves in favor of a union with Russia on a
federal basis. Unfortunately the Provisional
Governments of Lvov and Kerensky still dreamed
of a centralized and indivisible Russia. Had
Kerensky realized early Ukraine's just demands
for autonomy, the course of subsequent world
events might have been different, for Ukraine did
not come under the domination of the Bolsheviki
when they took over the government in Petrograd.
Nationalist Ukraine, alienated from Russia by
Lvov, Kerensky and Lenine, adopted a remarkably
broad-hearted attitude toward Russia, although
the ''separatists," mostly Austrophiles hailing
from Ruthenia, did attain considerable influence in
Ukrainian circles. Nevertheless, Ukraine's liberal
policy triumphed, as clearly shown by the Gen-
eral Proclamation of the Ukrainian National
Council of the 20th of November, 1917, which was
Ukraine's declaration of independence. It read,
in part, as follows :

UKRAINE 97

* ' Ukraiman people and all peoples of the
Ukraine! An hour of trials and difficulties has
come for the land of the Russian Republic. In the
north, in the capitals (Petrograd and Moscow),
a bloody internecine struggle is in progress. A
Central Government no longer exists, and anarchy,
disorder and ruin are spreading throughout the
State.

''Our country also is in danger. Without a
strong, united and popular Government, Ukraine
also may fall into the abyss of civil war, slaughter
and destruction.

''People of Ukraine, you together with the
brother peoples of Ukraine, have entrusted us with
the task of protecting rights won by struggle, of
creating order and building up a new life in our
land. And we, the Ukrainian Central Rada, by
your will, for the sake of creating order in our
country and for the sake of saving the whole of
Russia, announce that henceforth Ukraine be-
comes the Ukrainian National Republic. Without
separating from the Russian Republic, and pre-
serving its unity, we take up our stand firmly on
our lands that with our strength we may help the
whole of Russia and that the whole Russian Re-
public may become a federation of free and equal
peoples. . . .

"Likewise we shall insist that at the Peace
Congress the rights of the Ukrainian people in
Russia and outside Russia shall not be infringed

98 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

in the treaty of peace. But until peace comes,
every citizen of the Republic of Ukraine, together
with the citizens of all the peoples of the Rus-
sian Republic, must stand firmly in their positions
both at the front and in the rear. . . .

' ' Citizens ! In the name of the National Ukrain-
ian Republic in federal Russia, we, the Ukrainian
Central Rada, call upon all to struggle resolutely
with all forms of anarchy and disorder, and to help
in the great work of building up new State forms,
which will give the great and powerful Russian
Republic health, strength and a new future. The
working out of these forms must be carried out at
the Ukrainian and all-Russian Constituent As-
semblies."

The rise of Bolshevism in Russia produced a
corresponding effect on the proletariat of Ukraine,
and a struggle ensued between Ukrainian Bolshe-
vism and Ukrainian nationalism. The struggle
was of brief duration. Bolshevism succumbed to
the nationalist elements, reenforced by the Central
Powers, who were naturally interested in dis-
rupting Russia. The Ukrainians sent a separate
commission to negotiate peace with the Central
Powers. As a result of the separate peace the
Teutons extended their influence in Ukraine and
finally dissolved the Ukrainian national Rada
and set up in its stead a dictatorship headed by
Hetman Skoropadsky, who remained an power
leaning on German bayonets. The downfaB of the

UKRAINE 99

Central Powers naturally led to the downfall of
their puppet. The breakup of Austria liberated
the Austrian Ukrainians, or Ruthenians, and
there was no apparent obstacle toward their union
with Russian Ukraine. But such an obstacle did
arise as soon as the Poles learned that the Ukrain-
ian National Council took over the administration
of Eastern Galicia. The former would not admif
the national claims of the Ruthenians, and war
between the two races opened when Lemberg was
occupied by the Ukrainians. Polish troops re-
conquered the city, but the Ukrainians besieged
it again in January, 1919.

The Ukrainian problem is fairly complicated.
The Russian Ukrainians do not demand complete
separation from Russia, realizing that it would
cut off the latter from the Black Sea and virtually
strangle the hundred-million nation to the north.
Russian Ukraine would therefore prefer to be-
come an autonomous member of an all-Russian
federation. The Ukrainians in Galicia and Buko-
vina are actuated by two motives mainly. First,
liberation from the yoke of the Polish nobility and
separation from Poland. Second, reunion with
their brethren to the east.

If the principle of self-determination be justly
applied to the Ukrainian problem, its solution
would necessarily follow ethnic lines. But these
lines are rather vague in the east and north, where
the Little Russians and Great Russians and White

100 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Russians are merged. The Ukrainian national
council claimed in Russia for Ukraine the prov-
inces of Kiev, Podolia, Volhynia, Chernigov, Pol-
tava, Kharkov, Yekaterinoslav, Kherson and
Taurig (less the Crimea). In addition, it claimed
some districts of other adjoining provinces, in-
Jcluding that of Kholm, which the Poles also
claimed for Poland, thus creating another Polish-
Ukrainian quarrel. The main dispute is, of
course, in Galicia. The Poles claim Lemberg, the
capital of Eastern Galicia, on the ground that a
majority of its inhabitants are Poles. Counting
the Polish Jews, this is true of Lemberg and its
immediate vicinity. But do the Polish Jews pre-
fer Poland to Ukraine? And what about the in-
disputable fact that the larger territory in the
midst of which Lemberg is situated is inhabited by
a majority of Ukrainians?

When the ethnographic frontiers of Ukraine
are drawn, it emerges a vast country, stretching
from the Carpathians to the Caucasus. On the
south it is bounded by the Black Sea, Rumania
and Hungary; on the west, by Czecho-Slovakia
and Poland ; on the north and east by Russia. Ac-
cording to the Russian Imperial census of 1897
there were 22,000,000 Ukrainians in Russia, and
their number must have considerably increased in
the following twenty years. In Eastern Galicia
and Bukovina there were 4,000,000 Ukrainians,
bringing the present total for the nation well above

UKRAINE 101

30,000,000, spread over more than three hundred
thousand square miles, a territory almost as large
as France and Spain combined.

Ukraine is an extremely fertile and wealthy
country. Without Ukraine Russia would be un-
able to breathe and prosper. A settlement of the
Ukrainian problem can therefore not be effected
without consideration for Russia, as the latter
would sooner or later break the barrier of an in-
dependent Ukraine and provoke another war.
The Ukrainians realize this and, while pleading
for the recognition of their national rights, express
their willingness to enter a federation of Russian
States patterned after the United States of
America.

V

POLAND

The case of Poland exemplifies to an almost per-
fect degree all those elements which call for the
constitution of a subject people into a sovereign
nation. Historical justice, national consciousness,
ethnographic position are factors which in the
Polish problem are made of solid material. The
dismemberment of Poland is so fresh an event
in history that no just settlement of the problem
of nationality in Europe can be imagined without
the restoration of Polish sovereignty. The Polish
national consciousness does not suffer from a lack
of depth and vigor, but from too much strength
and passion. Ethnographically, Poland is a com-
pact territorial unit. It is bounded on the north by
East Prussia and extends to the Baltic Sea west
of Danzig; it touches Lithuania in the northeast
and adjoins White Russia and Ukraine in the
east ; on the south it is bounded by Czecho-Slova-
kia and on the west by Prussia.

The early history of Poland is wrapped in my-
thology. The ancestors of the Poles appeared on
the stage of European history about twelve cen-

105

106 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

turies ago. Inhabiting what is in effect a huge
plain, they became known to foreign travelers as
*'Polans," the word ''pole" in Slavic meaning
''field." These dwellers of what now is known
as Poland, were divided before the ninth century
into numerous independent tribes, governed by
elected chiefs.

During the reign of Otto the Great, Germany
became a menace to the Poles and they banded
themselves together under the leadership of one
of their chiefs, a member of the humble family
of the Piasts, who was elected the first ruler of
Poland in 842. He and his son consolidated the
country, introduced military reforms and taught
the Poles the art of organized warfare. How-
ever, the authentic records of Polish history date
from 962, when Micezyslaw I ascended the throne.
It was he who introduced Christianity into Poland,
through his marriage to a Christian princess of
Bohemia. In 968 he founded the city of Posen,
considered the cradle of their country by the Poles.
The expansion of Poland began with the reign
of Boleslaw I, in 992. He succeeded in winning
the friendship of Germany, after which he turned
to the East and conquered the rich Russian town
of Kiev. Boleslaw died in 1025, going down into
history as the Brave, and leaving a great empire
to his successors.

Meanwhile an event of tremendous consequence
to the Slavic races was occurring. The two great

POLAND 107

churches, the Greek and Roman, were struggling
to extend their respective influences over the Slavs.
While the Russians were coming under the domi-
nation of the Eastern Church, the Poles were being
brought into the folds of the Roman Church. This
division affected the future of Slavdom pro-
foundly. As one historian observes, the Eastern
Church cut off Russia to an enormous extent from
Western thought and culture, and threw her back
upon her own undeveloped resources and uncivil-
ized environment. Russia was the last of the great
powers to consolidate her empire. Poland, on the
other hand, through the Roman Church, had a
Western outlook. Western literature, art, philos-
ophy and science, as well as religion, flowed
within its borders, and as time went on greatly
widened the breach between Poland and Russia.

If not geographically, spiritually Poland became
a Western state. As such, it was the first to be-
come the victim of the Asiatic invasions that
swept over Europe, beginning with the thirteenth
century. In 1241 the Mongolian hordes, emerging
from the East, passed through Poland, leaving a
trail of blood and devastation in their wake. It
is interesting to observe that Poland's rehabilita-
tion, after the invasion, was effected with the co-
operation of large immigrant elements from West-
ern Europe, mostly Germans and Jews. The rea-
son for the movement of the latter into Poland
was largely religious. Persecuted in the West,

108 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

they found a haven in the new Slavic state, which
early proclaimed religious toleration. The Jews
came to Poland from Germany in the eleventh cen-
tury. A charter granting them the right to reside
in Polish cities was issued by King Ladislaw Her-
man in 1096.

In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries Poland
was in a state of internal discord. However, with
the rise of Casimir III to the throne in 1332 Poland
entered upon an era of greatness. A statesman of
the first rank, Casimir expanded his kingdom to
unprecedented size. Polish civilization made great
strides under Casimir 's rule. In 1347 a general
diet was convoked to promulgate national laws.
The fruit of this legislative assembly's labors was
the famous ''Statute of Wislica," Poland's Magna
Charta. Thirteen years before a law had been
enacted which freed the Jews from all civil and
commercial disabilities. In 1357 another statute,
improving the condition of the Jews, was passed.
In 1364 the University of Cracow was founded,
the second in Europe. An event of great impor-
tance occurred during Casimir 's reign, which
formed the foundation for one of the most compli-
cated phases of the present Polish problem.
Ruthenia, a vast stretch of land spreading from
the Danube to the Dnieper and beyond it, compris-
ing Eastern Galicia, with its capital Lwow, or
Lemberg, and Little Russia, with its capital Kiev,

POLAND 109

was inlierited by Casimir in 1340 from his mother.
This land is now known as the Ukraine.

After the death of Casimir, another important
event happened, which also left its mark deep in
the history of Poland. Qneen Jadwiga, a grand-
niece of Casimir, was united in marriage with Jag-
iello, the Prince of Lithuania, in 1386. The pur-
pose of this marriage was to bring about an en-
tente between Poland and Lithuania. Jagiello,
a pagan, was baptized by the name of Ladislaw II,
assumed the throne of the two countries under a
single crown. This union remained personal for
almost two centuries. It was only in 1569 that the
two states were knit into a close alliance through
the fusion of their national diets. One joint as-
sembly was elected by the provincial dietines and
Warsaw was chosen as the meeting-place for it,
being situated between the two countries.

It is vital to note that the force which held
Lithuania and Poland so long together was in-
troduced by the Poles in the thirteenth century
into the Baltic region. This force was the Order
of the Teutonic Knights, and a Polish duke in-
vited it to enter Old Prussia to combat its inhabi-
tants, who were of Slavonic origin. This was a
fatal blunder. The Teutons conquered the original
Prussians and soon became a menace to the Poles
and Lithuanians. They occupied the Baltic coast
and extended their power in all directions. In
1410 the famous Battle of Grilnwald was fought

110 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

between the Teutons and the Poles and Lithuani-
ans. The former were beaten and Poland re-
gained the towns of Danzig and Thorn. Eastern
Prussia was held by the Teutonic Knights under
the Eegis of Poland. It presents to-day one of the
greatest difficulties attending a just solution of the
Polish problem.

*'The sixteenth century," writes Nimian Hill,
' ' was the period when the prosperity and fame of
Poland reached its zenith. It was a wonderful
century everywhere, when the new life of the Ren-
aissance was pulsating with exuberant virility, and
Poland shared in no small measure its progress
and joy. Early in its course the new movement
found a champion in Sigismund I, whose second
wife was Bona Sforza, a daughter of the Duke of
Milan. Under their patronage Italian architects
and craftsmen were brought to Poland, where the
artistic temperament of the Poles assured them of
appreciation and encouragement. Art and science,
liberally supported by the wealth of the nobles,
flourished and led to a display of such luxury and
grandeur as excited the admiration of all Europe."

Simultaneously with the attainment by Poland
of its great position as a state in Europe the ele-
ments of disintegration were rising in her system.
And these elements were due to Poland's experi-
ments in democracy. Beginning with 1425, the
Polish diet began to exercise control over the elec-
tion of the country's kings. The diets were as-

POLAND 111

semblies representing the gentry, or szlacMa,
which was composed of the privileged classes.
The szlacMa became the decisive factor in Polish
national life. It used its elective powers to obtain
special rights and privileges. Thus it won its first
habeas corpus statute for recognizing the infant
son of Ladislaw II as heir to the throne. A king
would be elected for life, but his rule was con-
ditioned on his keeping of the promises made. In
case he failed to do so, the country was absolved
from all obedience to him. The diet met irregu-
larly, but the tendency was to limit the perogatives
of the king. In 1454 Casimir IV pledged himself
not to declare any war without the consent of the
diets. Shortly afterward the diet obtained control
over the national militia.

It is true, the szlaclita, which constituted the
diet, passed laws that were detrimental to any
other class of the people but themselves. Still, it
was a foundation for a legislative chamber that
in favorable circumstances would have developed
into a great parliamentary system. Perhaps if
Poland had been so situated geographically as to
be safe from foreign invasions and hostile neigh-
bors, it would have achieved, ultimately, demo-
cratic government. As it was, self-governed
Poland's only hope for the preservation of its
life lay in internal harmony and unity. This con-
dition, unfortunately, was absent from Polish life.
The jealousies of the various nobles superseded

112 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

the interests of the nation. The youthful Polish
democracy was therefore doomed to an existence
of constant peril from the very outset of its stormy
career.

Following the death of Sigismund II, a diet was
convoked to elect the new king. The constitution
was altered on the eve of the election so as to limit
the authority of the newly elected monarch to an
extraordinary degree. The king was to have no
voice in the election of his successor. He was not
to be an hereditary sovereign. He was to marry
a woman chosen by the senate and was to be under
the constant supervision of a Senate delegation.
The king could not lead any troops out of Poland
unless with the consent of the Assembly. The
elected candidate, Henry of Valois, found his
throne so uncomfortable that after a reign of
thirteen months he decided to flee. Stealing out
of his castle in the night, he fled on horseback with
a few servants to France.

Poland was, in effect, a republic. The diet soon
developed into a two-chamber assembly, the senate
being composed of the higher nobility, while the
lower house represented the poorer szlachta. But
that was not the age of republicanism in Eastern
Europe. It was the age of conquest and endless
warfare. A strong central government was what
Poland reaUy needed, but few realized it at the
time. The gentry, large and small, was dominated
by petty passions and selfish motives. They

POLAND 113

showed no disposition to share the burden of the
government. Theirs was but to criticize and to
see to it that no taxes be imposed on their class.
They took it for granted that it was up to the
king, once elected, to govern the state. It was
not for them to provide him with the necessary
resources. To be sure it was an erratic democracy.
But has democracy in the twentieth century
achieved perfection? Poland was groping in the
dark, but with a parliamentary system of govern-
ment, nevertheless. If Poland had been situated
like England, instead of in the midst of Europe,
surrounded by autocratic Russia and Germany,
it would finally have emerged a modem democracy.
But there was no safety in Poland's position and
peace was not to be its lot.

Up to 1648 Poland maintained its imposing state
in spite of internal discord and much external
trouble. Beginning with that year the disintegra-
tion of the Polish power followed with amazing
swiftness. That was the year of the great Ukrain-
ian revolt, under the leadership of Bogdan Elhmel-
nitsky, the famous Cossack hetman. The Ukrain-
ians were a free people, and the Cossacks among
them were recruited largely from daring refugees
from Russia. They were frontiersmen, used by
the Polish rulers to combat the Turks and Tartars
who occasionally emerged from the south. Grad-
ually, however, the Polish nobility extended its
grip on these freemen. They were rebellious

114 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

against this foreign yoke and finally broke loose,
led by Khmelnitsky, in a terrible war for political
and religious freedom. Ukraine rose, the Cossacks
united with the Tartars, and wiped out all Catho-
lics and Jews. The Polish nobles were murdered,
burned alive and their houses and castles reduced
to ashes. The Polish armies were annihilated,
one after another, and Poland lay prostrate before
the Ukrainian hosts. Khmelnitsky was recognized
as the hetman of Ukraine, and for a year and a
half ruled it. However, in 1651, Khmelnitsky and
his forces were defeated by Stefan Czarniecki,
the great Polish leader. This victory proved a
disaster to Poland. Ukraine transferred its al-
legiance to Russia, thereby bringing about one of
the most hideous wars in history.

Russia advanced against Poland, quickly oc-
cupied Lithuania and with the aid of the Cossacks
conquered Lemberg and Ruthenia, thus consolidat-
ing all of Ukraine under the Tsar's scepter. At
the same time Sweden saw its opportunity and
invaded Poland from the north, meeting practi-
cally with no resistance, as the Polish gentry de-
serted their King and went over to Sweden 's side.
Then, for a while, Poland was virtually wiped out
as a state. The king, John Casimir, fled to Silesia.
Warsaw and Cracow were occupied by the Swedes.

When everything seemed to have been irrepar-
ably lost, a religious and patriotic movement
originated at the C?;enstochowa Monastery, a,tn:i-

POLAND 115

ing at the restoration of the state. The insurgents
met with success in the beginning, as the Swedes
were then waging a bitter war against Denmark.
Under the leadership of Czarniecki the Poles
freed most of their country from the Russians and
the king was returned to his throne. But no great
change was wrought by the rebellion in the inter-
nal affairs of Poland. The country soon drifted
into its former condition of corruption and in-
trigue. The celebrated "Liberum Veto" was in-
troduced into the diet, by which a single dissenter
could defeat a bill and even dissolve the assembly.
Foreign governments utilized this extreme instru-
ment of democracy for their own benefit. The in-
ternal demoralization continued to grow in Poland,
in spite of the fact that it produced one of its
most brilliant rulers toward the end of the seven-
teenth century.

John Sobieski, a military genius of the first
rank, was chosen king in 1674. He defended his
country with great skill against the Turks and
later rendered imperishable service to the cause
of Western civilization, when he relieved Vienna,
in 1683, by inflicting a crushing blow upon the ag-
gressive Ottoman forces. After Sobieski followed
a period of civil war and another Swedish invasion.
Poland continued to decline during the eighteenth
century till it reached the stage when it '^ ceased
to exhibit any evidence of national life and vir-
tue,'* according to one publicist. "It was a time

116 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

of external peace, internal stagnation and moral
decay. . . . The end was hastening on. The de-
cline of Poland was irremediable."

Then followed the great crime. Prussia, Rus-
sia and Austria deliberately plotted to destroy the
Polish republic. What is usually overlooked
about this revolting plot is that it was carried out
by three Teutonic rulers, for Catherine the Great
was really a Prussian princess and the protegee of
Frederick the Great. It was the latter who took
the initiative in the movement to dismember
Poland. In 1769 he sent a special envoy to Russia
to sound Catherine on a scheme to partition
Poland. In 1772 the first partition of Poland oc-
curred.

What were the motives that urged Prussia and
Russia to fall upon Poland and tear it to pieces?
Paderewski says that '^ Poland fell because her
neighbors were greedy, unscrupulous and strong!
Poland fell because she was generous, humane and
weak! Poland fell, to tell you the truth, because
she had no permanent army to defend her posses-
sions. But, do not think that Poland fell alone!
With the Polish republic fell also the honor of
three monarchies. With our independence fell
also the apathetic conscience of civilized Europe.
They will not rise, they will not cleanse them-
selves, until our freedom is restored again."

But Poland fell also because she was evolving
a system of government contrary to the prin-

POLAND 117

ciple of autocracy. In fact, old, decayed Poland
was about to give way to a new, modern Poland.
France was undergoing a process that was bound
to have profound effects on Poland. France was
giving birth to those powerful ideas which her-
alded a new social and political world order.
Poland could not help reacting to them. It soon
followed France in the path of regeneration. But
it had the misfortune of being situated among
three powers that had already learned to elevate
autocracy into a modern institution. It was there-
fore in the interests of these powers to safeguard
their own system of government from the dangers
of democracy.

By the first partition Prussia robbed Poland of
the Baltic littoral, taking all of West Prussia, ex-
cept the cities of Danzig and Thorn. Russia ob-
tained the provinces of Polock, Vitebsk and Mog-
hilev, which were, strictly speaking, half Rus-
sian and half Lithuanian, but not Polish, in popu-
lation. Austria secured Galicia and some border-
ing territory. Thus, in the first partition only
Prussia and Austria obtained control over parts
of Poland that were inhabited by Poles.

Following the first partition comparative order
reigned in Poland for a couple of decades. The
people were under the delusion that the appetites
of their neighbors had been satisfied and that
henceforth Poland's integTity would be respected
and her independence secured. Intellectually,

118 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

Poland made great progress in the latter part of
the eighteenth century. Her trade flourished, in
spite of her loss of the Baltic littoral. The ideas
of Jean Jacques Rousseau and contemporary
French philosophers made headway among the
Poles. Politically, however, the Poles smarted
under the humiliation of Russian rule and in-
trigue, as the Polish king, Stanislaw, was the pup-
pet of Catherine the Great. Poland found an op-
portunity to breathe freely in 1787, when Rus-
sia became engaged in a war on Turkey. Poland
began to set her house in order. A diet was con-
voked, which went down into history under the
name of ^'The Four Years' Diet." It was to
elaborate a new constitution. The diet was com-
posed mainly of young, enthusiastic, patriotic
deputies. The constitution finally adopted by the
assembly made the form of government a limited
and hereditary monarchy. The Liberum Veto was
abolished. The franchise was so extended as to
give the vote to the townsmen, on an equal basis
with the nobles. The condition of the peasants
was improved. A provision was made for relig-
ious toleration. The constitution embodied many
other reforms, and it was greeted with tremendous
popular rejoicings. Poland became a democracy
in a modern sense, with a constitution that is still
considered to have been the most advanced of its
time.

The transformation that occurred in Poland

POLAND 119

was not to the liking of autocratic Eussia. Cathe-
rine the Great adopted at first a cold, and later an
openly hostile attitude toward the new Polish
revolutionary constitution. She was aided in her
designs by a group of treacherous Polish mag-
nates, led by Prince Felix Potocki, who were
naturally displeased with the democratic move-
ment. The Russian Empress now declared war
on Poland and sent an army of 100,000 against it.
The Polish forces were numerically much weaker
and were compelled to retire before the Eussian
invaders. The Poles appealed for help to Frede-,
rick William, King of Prussia, who had previously
approved of the constitution and adopted a
friendly policy toward Poland. However, he was
now embroiled in the celebrated campaign against
revolutionary France, and could not very well
support, even morally, a course in Poland whicfi
he opposed in France. He announced that he
would cooperate with Eussia and Austria in "re-
storing order ' ' in Poland.

''The Poles were aghast," according to one
writer, "at the turn of affairs. The constitution
from which so much had been expected, instead of
assuring peace and prosperity, was doing nothing
but increasing internal dissensions and causing
renewed foreign intervention." The Polish
troops, in spite of their hard resistance, were too
weak to withstand the Prussian and Eussian
armies. The former occupied Danzig and Thorn

120 THE RESUERECTED NATIONS

in January of 1793. Under the leadership of
Prince Joseph Poniatowski the Poles succeeded
in retarding somewhat the Russian advance.
Meanwhile, a new figure appeared on the scene.
His name was Thaddeus Kosciuszko, who fought
under Washington in the American War of In-
dependence. He brilliantly marshaled the small
forces of his country, but in vain. There was no
unity in the heart of Poland. The king was a
weakling, and with the lesson of Louis the Six-
teenth, who was executed on the 21st of January,
1793, before him, he joined the confederation of
the renegade Polish magnates that supported
Catherine's schemes. The constitution was re-
pealed, the Polish leaders fled, and the confeder-
ation was set up as the government of the country,
placing Poland virtually in the hands of Catherine.
In accordance with a secret treaty concluded
between Russia and Prussia, the second partition
of Poland then took place. To give this criminal
act a semblance of legality, a diet was assembled
at Grodno. Its membership was packed, and yet,
in spite of all threats from the Russian ambassa-
dor, it was slow to ratify the treaty of dismem-
berment. Finally, grenadiers were introduced
into the assembly-place and four cannon were
pointed against the meeting-chamber. The Rus-
sian general was present to enforce the ratifica-
tion. But to the eternal honor of the Poles, they
refused to be intimidated, even after four of them

POLAND 121

had been arrested. The deputies then decided not
to transact any business till their colleagues were
freed. Silence reigned in the hall Nobody spoke.
The Eussian ambassador made it clear that no
one would be allowed to leave the chamber unless
the treaty was ratified. Silence was the diet's
response to this, too. Hour after hour passed in
stillness. Midnight came and went in silence.
Finally, at three o'clock in the morning, after the
marshal had again asked the deputies for a votcj
it was suggested that silence might be construed as
an expression of assent. The Eussian ambassa-
dor read the instructions of Catherine, which in
addition to Eussia's annexation of Lithuania,
White Eussia, and the Ukrainian provinces incor-
porated in Poland, provided for the cession of
purely Polish territory to Prussia, and which was
the chief cause for the deputies ' objection. It was
then announced the treaty had been ratified. The
second partition of Poland was accomplished
through this "dumb sitting."

A wave of patriotic frenzy swept over Poland,
as a result of the humiliation of the second par-
tition. The spirit of revolt spread widely, fostered
by general dissatisfaction, due to the breakdown
of commerce and trade. It finally took the form
of an insurrection in Cracow where, on the 24th of
March, 1794, the cry was raised by the populace of
*' Liberty, Integrity and Independence!" The
man to whom the insurgents naturally turned was

122 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Kosciuszko, who was then living in retirement in
Dresden. He heard the call of his countrymen and
hurried to Cracow, where he assumed command
over all the Polish forces. He summoned the
people to arms in a manifesto in which he said:
''The last moment has arrived, in which despair,
in the midst of shame and reproach, puts arms
in our hands. Our hope is that scorn of death
which can alone ameliorate our lot and that of our
posterity."

Kosciuszko 's rebellion met with spectacular suc-
cesses at the beginning. Although his army was
badly equipped, he defeated the Russians in sev-
eral engagements. All Poland was ablaze with
the flame of revolt and rose against its oppressors,
sweeping them out of the country. Nevertheless,
it was too much for Poland to overcome the forces
of three mighty powers. The Prussian army ad-
vanced and Cracow was taken, opening the road
into Poland, after a battle in which the Poles were
outnumbered and defeated. The Prussians then
advanced toward Warsaw and invested the city,
but were unable to capture it. Meanwhile Cathe-
rine had concluded peace with Turkey and ordered
her general, Suvorov, to make speed with his army
toward Poland. The Empress was furious at the
insurgents and resolved, in her own words, ''that
the time has come, not only to extinguish to the
last spark the fire that has been lighted in our

POLAND 123

neighborhood, but to prevent any possible re-
kindling of its ashes."

On October the 10th, 1794, the Polish and Eus-
sian armies met, and the fatal battle in the history
of Poland was fought. Kosciuszko was wounded
several times and finally taken prisoner. A re-
mark was attributed to him which he later stoutly
denied having made. It was the famous ''Finis
Poloniae!" Poland, indeed, was finished. Suvo-
rov advanced, took Warsaw and ended the rising,
with a bloody massacre of the inhabitants of War-
saw. Thirteen thousand Poles were butchered by
the Russians, two thousand were drowned. Among
the valiant defenders of Warsaw was a Jewish
regiment, which perished to the last man.

There was much discord among the conquerors
over the spoils, the Russians claiming the lion's
share. An agreement was finally reached, in 1795,
whereby Austria annexed Cracow and a large
slice of territory; Prussia took Warsaw, with a
stretch of country as far as the Niemen, and
Russia got the rest. Thus Poland passed out of
existence.

The hopes of the Poles were raised with the rise
of Napoleon. His sweep eastward, his conquest
of Prussia and march into Russia won the sym-
pathies of the Polish people for him. They ex-
pected him to liberate and restore their country,
although he was never explicit on this point.
Upon his arrival in Warsaw he was greeted with

124 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

unbounded enthusiasm. It was there that he met
the beautiful Countess Walewska and fell in love
with her at first sight. She left her husband to
join Napoleon, and they had a son who afterward
had quite a distinguished career as a diplomat.
After defeating the Russians, Napoleon created at
Tilsit, on July 7th, 1807, the Duchy of Warsaw.
The Poles were naturally not satisfied with this
small kingdom and gallantly fought the Austrians,
regaining Cracow and Western Galicia. Eighty
thousand Poles supported Napoleon's disastrous
campaign in Russia in 1812. With the passing
of Napoleon, the Duchy of Warsaw expired. At
the Congress of Vienna, 1815, Poland was re-
distributed among the partitioning powers. The
city of Cracow was constituted an independent
little republic, while the purely Polish provinces
that went to Russia were set up as an autonomous
kingdom with Alexander I as hereditary ruler.
Differences developed between Russia and the
Polish kingdom, which culminated in a r«^volt in
1830, following the French revolution of that
year. The Poles put up a valiant fight, but were
crushed by Nicholas I, and their autonomy was
abolished. Again in 1848, when the tide of revolu-
tion rose in Western Europe, Poland became a
center of rebellion. This time it proved the end
of the Cracow principality. Then in 1863 a rising
of large dimensions again broke out in Russian
Poland. It was suppressed in torrents of blood.

POLAND 125

The hand of Tsarism lay heavy on political Poland.
The country became a virtual province of the Rus-
sian Empire, and was subjected to an intense cam-
paign of Russification. Prussian Poland fared
even worse, for the German autocracy was more
efficient, and its campaign of Prussianization
proved more merciless and deadly.

However, from 1863 to 1914 Poland, partitioned
among the three empires, prospered economically.
Especially was this prosperity marked in Russian
Poland, where commerce and industry reached
enormous proportions. The Polish provinces be-
came the most progressive section of Russia in
education, in manufacture, in trade, and in the
development of natural resources. In spite of
all the efforts of the Tsar 's government to Russify
Poland, the Poles retained their national con-
sciousness and cohesion, and Poland seethed with
nationalistic movements. Its literature, poetry,
music blossomed luxuriantly. Poland became a
great center of modern civilization.

Then came the Great War. On the fields of
Poland immense armies swayed back and forth,
killing, pillaging, devastating. These armies had
hundreds of thousands of Poles on the side of
Russia opposed to hundreds of thousands of Poles
in the ranks of the Austro-German forces. For
Poland, therefore, it was a terrible experience.
But even more terrible was the ruin wrought in
its fair cities and villages. According to some

126 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

estimates, three hundred towns, twenty thousand
villages, two thousand churches were razed to
the ground. Millions were set adrift, wandering
eastward back of the Russian armies. Billions
of dollars in property were destroyed.

Politically, Poland was torn in two. The work-
ing classes, generally speaking, favored the Cen-
tral Powers, being actuated by deep hatred for
Tsarism. The upper classes favored an under-
standing with Russia. As soon as the war broke
out the former rallied around Joseph Pilsudski,
a Russian Polish revolutionary leader, who led
a Polish Legion organized in Galicia against the
Russian army. But the Russians were at first vic-
torious. In the fall of 1914 Grand Duke Nicholas
issued his celebrated manifesto, promising auton-
omy to a re-united Poland. Although the Rus-
sian conduct in the occupied Polish territory was
not of a nature to encourage Polish national
optimism, the Grand Duke's proclamation had a
profound effect. However, Hindenburg's great
victory over the Russian armies in 1915 placed all
of Poland in the hands of the Central Powers.
After more than a year of hesitation Austria and
Germany declared, on November 5, 1916, Polish
"independence." The Central Powers wanted
Pilsudski to raise an army to cooperate with them,
but the Polish radical and his party would not
agree to do it unless guaranteed a strictly Polish
national government for the country.

POLAND 127

The Russian Revolution of 1917 brought Poland
near to Russia. The Petrograd Provisional Gov-
ernment addressed the following words to the
Poles : ''The Russian nation, which has shaken off
its yoke, recognizes also the absolute right of the
brother nation of Poland to decide its own fate
by the exercise of its own will, . . . The Polish
nation, liberated and unified, will settle for itself
the nature of its own government, expressing its
will by means of a Constituent Assembly, convoked
on the basis of universal suffrage in the capital of
Poland. ' ' This proclamation made the Poles anti-
Teutonic. Deep differences developed between
the Central Powers and the Warsaw Regency
Council, and ended in the arrest of the once Aus-
trophile General Pilsudski and his imprisonment
in Germany.

Meanwhile a Polish National Committee was set
up in Paris by leading exiles, representing the
tendencies of the Polish upper classes, especially
the nobility. The chief figures in this committee
were I. J. Paderewski, the famous pianist, and R.
Dmowski, formerly the head of the Polish dele-
gation in the Russian Duma. A Polish army was
organized in Prance, under General Haller, to co-
operate with the Allies, and France, England,
Italy and the United States recognized it in 1918
as a co-belligerent force. Thousands of American
Poles voluntarily joined the army of General
Haller.

128 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

When Austria-Hungary collapsed a Polish gov-
ernment sprang up in Galicia under the presidency
of the Socialist Daszynski, but he handed over his
authority to Pilsudski upon the surrender of Ger-
many and his release from prison. The Germans
were then expelled from Poland and the Poles
proceeded to consolidate their liberated country.
It was while doing so that the Poles came in con-
flict with their neighbors, at a time when peace at
home was not yet established. The arrival of
Paderewski in Poland in the last days of 1918
caused a crisis between the conservative and radi-
cal elements in the country. The foimer even
made an effort to overthrow Pilsudski 's govern-
ment, but failed.

The solution of the Polish international problem
has not been worked out yet on an equitable basis
even theoretically. Polish national aspirations, it
must be frankly acknowledged, are annexationist.
While the elements represented by R. Dmowski
aim at the creation of a centralized Polish empire
numbering between 35,000,000 and 40,000,000 in-
habitants, nearly half of whom would be non-
Polish, the radical patriotic elements, considerably
less avaricious, still lay claim to Lithuania, as if
the latter were not a distinct nationality with
rights of its own. In order to solve the Polish
problem it is necessary to settle Poland's disputes
with Lithuania, Russia, Ukraine, Czecho-Slovakia,
Germany, and the Jews. Had the Poles been will-

POLAND 129

ing to leave all these settlements to the Peace Con-
ference, a great deal of racial and national enmity-
would have been averted. There is only one way
to solve the Polish territorial problem justly, and
that is to find an ethnographic solution, and not
an historical one. The entire civilized world rec-
ognizes Poland's indisputable right to sovereign
national existence, as well as the crime committed
by Russia, Austria and Prussia in partitioning
Poland. And yet the restoration of Poland as
it existed in 1772, before the first partition, would
be a monstrosity. Poland was then a conglomer-
ate state, a huge empire, but not a nation. Within
its borders were then large sections of Great Rus-
sian, White Russian, Little Russian, Lithuanian,
Latvian (Lettish), and German territory.

To recreate that empire would be equivalent to
the restoration of the disrupted Dual Monarchy.
And yet there are Polish leaders who go nearly as
far as advocating such a *' solution" of their
national problem. What will have happened
if they actually take over the control of Poland
can be imagined from what really did happen
under the dictatorship of the radical Pilsudski.
Within a few days after his rise to power the
Poles were fighting with the Lithuanians, White
Russians, Ukrainians, Jews, and Germans. Pil-
sudski's government publicly claimed Vilna, the
capital of Lithuania, and some districts of White
Russia. The Lithuanians and White Russians

130 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

called upon the Bolsheviki of Russia to support
them against the aggression of Poland. In Gali-
cia bloody warfare occurred between the Ukrain-
ians and the Poles, mainly over Lemberg and Prze-
mysl, in which the Jews suffered greatly. In the
west, a Polish force, after occupying Posen, which
rightfully belongs to Poland, spread out in every
direction, toward Breslau, Silesia; Berlin, the cap-
ital of Germany ; and Danzig, the great Baltic port.
Now Danzig and its immediate vicinity are Ger-
man ethnographically. To the west of Danzig a
strip of territory about twenty-five miles wide,
inhabited by a majority of Poles, connects the Bal-
tic with the bulk of Poland. However, it is gener-
ally agreed that Poland ought to have access to
the sea, that the port of Danzig ought to be made
available to the Poles, which could be done by mak-
ing it a free port, but the Polish government was
not satisfied to leave the settlement of the prob-
lem to the Peace Conference and proceeded to
seize the city by force.

In the case of Poland, then, the diflSculties lie
mainly in the strength of the national spirit of
the Polish people. Poland must be re-united. Po-
land must be independent. These two demands
have the approval of civilized mankind. But how
are you going to curb the annexationist tendencies
of Polish nationalism 1 This nationalism must be
reconciled, to insure peace, with the legitimate
claims of the Lithuanians, Russians, Ukrainians,

POLAND 131

Germans, and Jews. The last present an inter-
nal question, but a sore one. There will be about
three million Jews in the new Poland. The rela-
tions between the Jews and the Poles in the past
decade have been very strained. The Poles, led by
anti-Semites like Dmowski, had organized an eco-
nomic boycott of the Jews which resulted in great
suffering to them. An even more important re-
sult was the awakening in the Polish Jews of ex-
treme nationalistic tendencies, which widened the
chasm betwen them and the Poles. To satisfy
all the demands of the Polish Jews would be an
infringement of Polish rights, it must be admitted.
But that the Jews in Poland should enjoy full re-
ligious, political, cultural and economic freedom,
such as they are enjoying in the United States of
America, for instance, seems but elementary jus-
tice. This was recognized by the government of
Pilsudski, which announced its intention to solve
the Polish-Jewish problem on such a basis.

There can be no just and definite solution of
Poland's boundary questions unless it rests on
purely ethnographic lines. More than in any other
case, Polish historical claims are pregnant with
international disputes. Poland must be re-united,
free and independent, with access to the sea, but
must include only genuinely Polish lands.

VI

LITHUANIA

There is a widespread impression that the Lith-
uanians are a Slavic race. This is not true. The
Lithuanians, together with the Letts and the ex-
tinct Old Prussians, formed a distinct branch of
the Indo-European family. They occupied the
southeastern coast of the Baltic Sea early in the
history of Europe and inhabited the basin of the
River Niemen and the territory lying between the
Vistula and the Dwina a thousand years ago. The
country that later became known as Lithuania was
a thickly-forested, marshy, inaccessible land, the
dwellers of which preserved their primitive life
longer than their neighbors. Their fighting quali-
ties made them the masters of a large stretch of
territory, extending at one time as far north as
the Gulf of Finland. They remained pagans even
after the neighboring races had adopted Christian-
ity.

With the rise of strong nations in the east and
west of their country, the Lithuanians were put on
the defensive, fiercely fighting the Russians and
the Poles. The latter fouud the Lithuanians and

132

LITHUANIA 133

their kindred races so troublesome that they in-
vited the Teutonic Knights to enter the Baltic lit-
toral, ostensibly to spread Christianity, but really
to combat the savage inhabitants of the region.
It was this movement that turned part of the Bal-
tic littoral into German territory known to us now
as East and West Prussia.

The Lithuanians were able to withstand the
onslaughts of the Teutonic Knights, although
parts of their territory were overrun and occu-
pied by the invaders. The Lithuanians to-day
claim those parts of Prussia under the name of
Lithuania Minor as properly belonging to them,
insisting that the inhabitants had never been Ger-
manized during the centuries that they formed
part of Prussia. Because of their paganism, the
light-haired, blue-eyed, massive, warlike inhabi-
tants of the valley of the Niemen were subjected
to efforts at Christianization by the Greek Ortho-
dox Russians and the Roman Catholic Poles. It
was the Lithuanian resistance that finally gave
birth to a united Lithuanian state. The pressure
of the Christians was too great, especially after
the Lithuanian cousins, the Letts, had been con-
verted to Christianity and organized into the Li-
vonian Order, which pushed onward in its cam-
paign to spread Christianity. The Lithuanians
were surrounded by aggressive Christian forces,
which included adventurous crusaders from all
over Europe. The Lithuanian ruler of the period.

134 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Mindaugas, resolved to submit to Rome and be
baptized, which ceremony took place in 1250. Pope
Innocent IV was so pleased that he rewarded the
Lithuanian chief with a crown, making Mindau-
gas the first king of Lithuania.

With the adoption of Christianity the Lithuan-
ian king expected to regain his former possessions
and consolidate his state. However, he encoun-
tered the opposition of the Christian Orders and
found it expedient to recant in order to lead an
uprising of all the Lithuanian tribes against the
Livonian Order. The rising was successful, al-
though Mindaugas was killed three years after he
recanted, in 1260. He was followed by a series of
Lithuanian rulers, of whom the most renowned
was Gedeminas, 1316-1341, the first ruler to es-
tablish a system of government in Lithuania. He
extended his dominions over many principalities
to the east and south, so that in the fourteenth cen-
tury Lithuania included practically all of White
Russia, a portion of Great Russia and a consider-
able section of Little Russia, or Ukraine. Gede-
minas concluded a treaty with Poland in 1325,
forming a military alliance against the Livonian
Order, as well as the foundation for the later
union of Lithuania and Poland.

Lithuania embraced Christianity in 1386 as the
result of the marriage of its ruler Jagello to the
queen of Poland, Jadwiga. The Lithuanian ruler
thus became the king of Poland, It is from this

LITHUANIA 135

year that the controversy over the Polish-Lithuan-
ian union dates. According to the Poles, the mar-
riage constituted the virtual fusion of Lithuania
and Poland into one sovereign state. According
to the Lithuanians, the marriage of Jagello re-
moved him from Lithuanian life, and their coun-
try continued to exist as an independent entity.
It would appear that the union was in fact but
nominal, as the Lithuanians elected a successor
to Jagello, an able leader, named Vitautas. Hence-
forth Poland and Lithuania fought conjointly the
Teutonic Order, and in 1410, at Griinwald, the
two allies decisively defeated the Teutons and
stopped their spread eastward. In the fifteenth
century Lithuania reached its greatest territorial
limits, stretching from the Baltic Sea in the north
to the Black Sea in the south.

Up to 1569 the relations between Lithuania and
Poland remained unchanged. The Poles contin-
ued to elect as their kings the descendants of Ja-
gello who ruled over Lithuania. In that year, dur-
ing the reign of Sigismond Augustus, an assembly
was convoked in Lublin, which resulted in the
fusion of the two states. ''Here over the protests
of a large number of the Lithuanian delegates,"
writes a Lithuanian publicist, "the Lublin Union
was formed under which Lithuania and Poland
were welded together into one so-called republic,
ruled by the privileged nobility. Both states were
presided over by one head and were permitted but

136 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

one senate and one 'Sejm' (the Lower House),
wiiicli convened alternately first in one, then in
the other country. A single coat of arms was
adopted, with the insignia of both countries incor-
porated in the seal. The customs duties between
the two nations were entirely abolished. In the
face of all this, however, Lithuania persisted in
maintaining her own army, her own fiscal and ju-
dicial system, and certain of her administrative
officers, such as Marshal, Chancellor, a Hetman
and others."

Lithuania remained a part of Poland till the
dismemberment of the latter. It is this that gives
ground for the Polish argument that the restora-
tion of Poland entails the incorporation in it of
Lithuania. Had the Lithuanians been assimilated
by the Poles during the centuries that they be-
longed to Poland, the present Polish claim to Lith-
uania might be justified. However, such is not the
case. The Lithuanians display a vigorous national
consciousness, and deny that they had ever been
Polonized. Polish penetration into Lithuania
never went further than a spiritual union between
the nobility of the two countries. The Lithuanian
peasantry never came under the influence of the
Poles and preserved their own language, tradi-
tions and even many of their ancient heathen
practices and ceremonies.

In the first partition of Poland, 1772, Russia's
share was really a perfectly legitimate one. Rus-

LITHUANIA 137

sia took away from Poland provinces that were in-
corporated in Lithuania before it had joined Po-
land, but which were really Russian. It is both
curious and significant that even at the second
partition, 1793, in which Germany and Austria
came in possession of genuinely Polish lands, Rus-
sia's share was still legitimate as the territories
which Russia then detached from Poland were not
Polish, not Lithuanian, strictly speaking, but
White Russian. A Lithuanian writes that at the
second partition Russia received so-called Russian
Lithuania, and the Lithuanians were left only Lith-
uania proper. Thus the ethnographical borders
of Lithuania were thereby defined by the Rus-
sians themselves. At the third partition in 1795
Russia took all that remained of Lithuania, with
the exception of the province of Suvalki, which
went to Prussia, and later was added by Napoleon
to the Duchy of Warsaw. The Congress of Vienna
ceded this province to Russia, with the Kingdom
of Poland.

What would have happened to Lithuania had
she not joined Poland in the sixteenth century will
always remain a subject for speculation. Some
Lithuanians beheve that the union with Poland
brought about Lithuania's ruin. According to
them, Lithuania degenerated when united with
Poland. "The state was dissolved, the upper
classes became separated from the common peo-
ple, who still remained faithful to their language,

138 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

though they were without schools, without any
rights, and were oppressed by the degrading sys-
tem of serfdom. Lithuania, during this period,
made no progress in literature, political economy,
or business, but rather degenerated in these
branches of activity. ' '

It is hardly conceivable that an independent
Lithuania would have emerged and existed in mod-
ern times with powerful, aggressive Russia sur-
rounding it. It is probable, though, that Lithu-
ania, swallowed up by Russia, would still have
remained a strongly individual national body, even
as Poland was in all the years that it formed part
of the Russian Empire. In fact it was the Rus-
sian oppression that stimulated the development
of the national consciousness in all the subject
races of the Empire. The Lithuanians were
treated in the traditional manner. A campaign of
Russification was inaugurated in their land, abol-
ishing every vestige of Lithuanian autonomy and
national life. The Universiay of Vilna, the capi-
tal of Lithuania, and many other schools, were
closed in 1832. In 1864 all the Lithuanian native
publications were suppressed and the Russian lan-
guage was imposed upon them. The Lithuanians
were also persecuted on account of their Roman
Catholic faith. Finally, the Russians went as far
as colonizing Lithuanian lands with Russians, who
were encouraged and financially helped to settle
in Lithuania.

LITHUANIA 139

The persecutions resulted iu a large emigration.
About three hundred thousand Lithuanians emi-
grated into the interior of Russia and into Poland
and the neighboring provinces. Gradually the
stream of emigration grew in size, passing through
England and Scotland, extending as far as South
Africa, New Zealand, Argentina, Canada and the
United States. There are nearly eighty thousand
Lithuanians in Chicago alone. If the Lithuanian
claim to Kosciusko, who was a native of Lithu-
ania, be upheld, the Lithuanians would have rea-
son to be proud of their contribution to the mak-
ing of the United States. At present there are
nearly three-quarters of a million Lithuanians in
the United States.

The Lithuanian national consciousness finds its
expression in the Lithuanian literature and cul-
ture, as well as the movement for independence.
Lithuanian writers first appear in the sixteenth
century. Between 1547 and 1701 fifty-nine Lithu-
anian books were published. The translator of the
Bible, the Reverend Dauksa, a famous preacher,
was also a Lithuanian nationalist. "To take the
language from a nation is equivalent," he said,
'Ho taking the sun from the heavens, to destroy-
ing world-order, to snuffing out the life and the
honor of a nation." In the eighteenth century
Lithuanian poetry reached a high standard, when
the remarkable pastoral poem by Christian Don-
elaitis, ''The Joys of Spring," was written. It

140 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

was rendered into German under the name of
' ' The Four Seasons ' ' and into Russian by the Im-
perial Academy and also by two modern poets.
After 1864 the Lithuanians were forbidden to print
even a prayer-book in their own language and in
the Latin characters. It was therefore in foreign
lands that the Lithuanian national press was born.
In 1883 a Lithuanian periodical was established
at Tilsit, Prussia, which clearly set forth the ideas
of Lithuanian nationalism, independent of Poland
and its culture. Since then the Lithuanian na-
tional movement gained in intensity at such a rapid
pace, that in 1905 the Lithuanians were among the
first to lead in the Russian revolution of that year.
With the freedom then gained by the Russian peo-
ple, the Lithuanians were allowed to use their
own language. In Vilna alone a dozen periodicals
sprang up in a decade. Altogether there were
about seventy publications appearing in Lithua-
nian all over the world. A Russian professor
wrote a quarter of a century ago of the Lithuanian
national movement: "Young Lithuania has suc-
ceeded, first, in developing a new spelling and
literary language for the Lithuanian people, sec-
ondly, it has satisfactorily explained the close eth-
nographic relationship existing between the Letts
and the Lithuanians and has pointed out the abso-
lute divergence of the interests of the Lithuanian
intellectuals from those of the Poles. . . . The
Poles may say what they please, but the fact re-

LITHUANIA 141

mains that the Lithuanians inhabiting the Lithua-
nian territory not only continue to speak their
own native tongue, but have also been successful
in preserving their ancient customs and traits. ' '

In the revolutionary year of 1905 the Lithua-
nians called a national assembly, which met in Vil-
na. Two thousand delegates, representing every
section and class, came to the Congress. Some
of the envoys were said to have been unable to
speak their native tongue, but insisted that they
were of Lithuanian blood. The Lithuanian repre-
sentatives in the Duma were always on guard to
defend their national rights, claiming autonomy
and demanding the separation of the province of
Suvalki from the Kingdom of Poland. Both the
Poles and the Eussians were hostile to the Lithua-
nian movement, which constantly gained strength
from the support given to it by the Lithuanian col-
onists abroad, notably in the United States and
Great Britain.

The Great War caused immense suffering in
Lithuania, where the contending hosts fought long
and stubbornly. But it also gave an added im-
petus to Lithuanian nationalism. In an appeal
made to their brethren in America, the Lithuanian
leaders said early in the war: ''Strenuous and
telling times are here. We must emerge free, or
die fighting for freedom. Lithuanians have vital-
ity and strength enough to be equals of all other
free nations. We must win the right to mould our

142 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

own destiny and our own future. Now is the time
to take our faith in our hands — now, or never ! ' '

After Grand Duke Nicholas, the Conunander-in-
Chief of the Russian Army, issued his manifesto
to the Poles toward the end of 1914, promising
restoration of their country, the Lithuanian politi-
cal committee of Vilna issued the following state-
ment:

"Lithuania is a separate unit historically, cul-
turally, and economically.

"Lithuania will defend herself to the bitter end
against every attempt of the Poles to spread Pol-
ish propaganda in Lithuania under the pretext of
the historical union of the two countries.

"Because certain Poles deliberately and fraud-
ulently misrepresent the identity of Poles and
Lithuanians, it becomes indispensable for the na-
tional life of Lithuania to combat such political
methods of the Poles and to disclose to the world
the actual relations as they exist between the Poles
and the Lithuanians.

"It is essential to struggle for the unification of
Lithuania, i. e. for the union of the government of
Suvaiki and of Lithuania Minor to Lithuania and
it is vital to obtain the right of political self-deter-
mination for the Lithuanians."

In the course of the World War several Lithua-
nian conventions and conferences met in foreign
countries, in Stockliolm, in Berne, Lausanne, and
in the United States. They all set forth umnis-

LITHUANIA 143

takably the principles of Lithuanian nationalism.
In Eussia, after some secret meetings, the Lithua-
nian National Council, representing all the parties
of the country, was formed, dedicated to the at-
tainment of independence for the Lithuanian na-
tionality. The Russian Revolution naturally gave
a tremendous impetus to the Lithuanian move-
ment. The Lithuanian National Council adopted a
declaration in which it stated that "Lithuania is a
separate ethnographical, cultural, economic, and
political unit, and as regards numbers and eco-
nomic considerations, the Lithuanians constitute
the basic element of Lithuania's inhabitants."

However, all the Lithuanian manifestos were in-
effective, for the simple reason that practically all
Lithuania was occupied by the German armies.
The Lithuanians exerted all their efforts in influ-
encing Russian public opinion in their favor, but
the Provisional Government of Russia was slow
to recognize Lithuania's claims, favoring an ar-
rangement with Poland whereby the latter would
include Lithuania, so as to lay the basis for a Rus-
sian-Polish union. In October, 1917, there met in
Kiev a congress of twenty-two minor Russian na-
tionalities. This convention passed on the claims
of all the subject races of Russia. It adopted a
series of resolutions, one of which was on the
Lithuanian question, demanding that:

"The Provisional Government of Russia issue
a proclamation recognizing the right of Lithuania

144 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

to form a sovereign state of Lithuania out of the
Russian and Prussian Lithuanian territories and
of the Lithuanian districts of the Government of
Suvalki, in conformity with the principle of self-
determination."

Ethnographically, the Lithuanian problem is not
easy of solution. Fortunately the Lithuanians do
not demand the restoration of their country as
it existed at the height of its career as a state.
''The platform of every active political party in
Lithuania contains the demand for the right of
self-determination within the whole of ethno-
graphic Lithuania. All these parties realize only
too well that it would be both fatal and wrong to
desire the reestablishment of historic Lithuania
which extended over a vast expense inhabited by
many other races. Nor would any of them lay the
slightest claim to lands which were genuinely
Lithuanian in times remote, but whose inhabitants
subsequently suffered complete transformation as,
for instance, Western Prussia, where the popula-
tion has ceased being Lithuanian altogether in
speech, in custom and in spirit." Thus reads a
Lithuanian statement.

By a secret agreement concluded between Rus-
sia and the Allies and made public by the Bolshe-
vist government, Russia was to annex as a result
of the war German Lithuania Minor. Had that
treaty been carried out, all Lithuania would have
been reunited under Russian protection. Lithua-

LITHUANIA 145

nia Minor has a population of about half a mil-
lion. Russian Lithuania, or Lithuania Major,
comprising the government of Kovno, the larger
parts of the governments of Vilna and Suval-
ki, and sections of the governments of Grod-
no and Minsk, has a population of nearly five mil-
lion. An independent Lithuanian state would thus
have a population of five million, more than Ser-
bia or Bulgaria before the war, almost as populous
as Denmark and Norway put together, or nearly
equal to either Sweden or Portugal.

There is a movement in Lithuania for a union
with the Letts. Should such an alliance be con-
summated the united state would contain a
population of more than seven million. Given a
chance there is no reason why the Lithuanians
should not prosper and develop economically and
culturally. Their land is fertile and abundant with
forests. Germany exploited Lithuania to an enor-
mous extent. By the way of the Niemen River
alone she imported from Lithuania about three
hundred million cubic feet of wood. Russia did
not seek to develop Lithuania's resources. If any-
thing, she hampered such a development. And yet
the Lithuanian people are capable of producing a
high state of civilization. To insure such an out-
come, it is but necessary to allow Lithuania free
and autonomous development and start it on the
road to progress.

VII

LETTONIA

The Letts are of the same origin as the Old
Prussians, who no longer retain their racial char-
acteristics, having been absorbed by the Teuton
invaders, and the Lithuanians. Lettonia, or Li-
vonia, or Latvia, the homeland of the Letts, lies
immediately to the north of Lithuania, on the Bal-
tic littoral, about equally divided by the Dwina
River. North of Lettonia lies Esthonia. To the
east of it is Russia. Of the three Baltic provinces
of the Russian empire, Courland, Livonia or Liv-
land, and Esthonia, the first and the greater part
of the second are inhabited by the Letts and com-
prise Lettonia.

The Letts number about 2,000,000. They have
lived in their land since time immemorial and are
the only rightful masters of it. The Letts are not
of Slavonic origin, neither are they related to
the Mongolian Finns, dwelling to the north of
them. They are, together with the Lithuanians,
the only survivors of a distinct branch of the Indo-
European family. They speak a language closely
related to the Lithuanian. But they are separated

146

LETTONIA 147

from the latter by religion, being Lutherans, while
the Lithuanians are Eoman Catholics.

It was the Germans who brought Christianity
into Lettonia, and in doing so subjugated the Letts.
The first Germans to come into the country were
traders from Liibeck. They were followed by mis-
sionaries of Christianity who founded the town of
Eiga in 1201 and organized a military body, the
Livonian Order, to Christianize the Letts. There
were not many of these Germans, but they con-
quered the land and settled on it as rulers, even-
tually assuming baronial titles. During the Kef-
ormation they embraced Lutheranism, communi-
cating it to the Letts.

When the Livonian Order was dissolved and
Sweden gained control of the Baltic region, the
oppressed population received some freedom and
education. During the reign of Gustavus Vasa,
King of Sweden, in the first part of the sixteenth
century, many schools were established in Let-
tonia. The benevolent rule of the Swedes did not,
however, carry with it the overthrow of the im-
mediate overlords, the Teutonic nobles, who were
thoroughly hated by the Lettish peasantry. When
Charles XII was defeated at Poltava in 1709, the
Baltic lands came under the aegis of Peter the
Great and became part of the Eussian Empire.

It was from the ranks of the Teutonic nobihty
in the Baltic provinces that autocratic Eussia re-
cruited in the past two centuries many of its lead-

148 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ing statesmen, administrators and reactionary
governors. Up to the outbreak of the Great War
these Baltic Junkers were intimately identified
with all that was sinister in Tsardom, maintain-
ing only remote relations with their German
cousins. Perhaps in all the breadth and width of
Russia there was not another region where the
hand of the landlords lay heavier on the peasants.
The Teuton nobles barred even the slightest re-
forms introduced by Russia. In the early days of
the reign of Alexander I an attempt was made by
the then liberal Russian government to relieve the
lot of the Lettish serf, but it was thwarted by the
German masters, who were greatly helped by the
corrupt clergy.

About the middle of the nineteenth century the
Lettish peasants began to show signs of rebellion.
Several times they revolted against their oppres-
sors, but were suppressed by Russian troops.
With the abolition of serfdom in Russia in 1861
there occurred nothing in Lettonia to improve the
condition of the peasant. He was free, but he
was landless, practically the entire country was
owned by the small group of barons. The Letts
were thus dependent upon their foreign masters
for a living. There was little change in the agra-
rian situation in Lettonia in the period that
elapsed between 1861 and 1917. More than two-
thirds of Lettish lands are in the hands of the
German nobility even now, although the nobles

LETTONIA 149

comprise only four and a half per cent, of the
population. They maintained their feudal grip
in spite of the growth of civilization, the expan-
sion of commerce, the development of cities, the
rise of a large middle-class in Lettonia during the
past half century.

In Courland two-fifths of all private lands are
owned by 25 barons' families. Some of these es-
tates are larger than the state of New Jersey or
Massachusetts. There are families that own
about a quarter of a million of acres. In Livonia
conditions are even worse. Sixty-five per cent, of
all the land there is owned by 740 estates. There
is one landowner, Count von Wolf, who owns half
a million acres ! There are only about 50,000 small
farms in Lettonia. ''All farmers depend entirely
on the landlords," writes J. Klawa. "Woods,
waters, the rights of hunting and fishing (on the
farmer's own land, no matter if it is paid for), are
privileges of the barons only. The establishment
of industries in the country and commerce are the
rights of the barons. But that is not all. The
farmers are obliged to bear all burdens of the com-
monwealth, such as repairing the roads, keeping
up the schools, paying the wages of school-teach-
ers, etc. The barons pay nothing."

Lettonia took a most prominent part in the Eus-
sian Revolution in 1905. Because of the cruel con-
dition of the masses, the outbreak was more sweep-
ing there than in the rest of the empire. It was a

150 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

rising, not only against Tsarism, but mainly
against the Teuton barons. For a while the peo-
ple were on top. The foreign masters that had
dominated them for seven centuries were driven
out of the country. But they soon returned with
a Russian force, commanded by General Orlov,
one of the most execrable hangmen of the Tsar.
There followed a frightful series of massacres,
executions and devastating deeds, unparalleled
even in Russia during that period of repression.
There were thousands of executions, many more
thousands of arrests and banishments to Siberia.
Hundreds of peasants' homes were burned.

During the World War Lettonia suffered ter-
ribly, being in the path of the great contending
armies. With the permission of the Duma in
July, 1915, the Letts organized and equipped a
legion of their own and in the autumn of that year
they took the tield to defend their native land. On
the other hand, the German barons welcomed the
Prussian invaders. Many thousands of the inhabi-
tants left their homes and moved eastward, fear-
ing subjection by the Germans. When the Revolu-
tion broke out in March, 1917, it quickly rever-
berated in Lettonia. The Letts were ardent revo-
lutionists and they were spiritually united with
the Russian democracy. They proceeded to or-
ganize an autonomous government in those parts
of their country that were unoccupied by the Prus-
sian army. Around the Lettish legion rallied many

LETTONIA 151

Letts that served in Russian regiments and the
Lettish force became one of the bulwarks of the
Russian Revolution. During Kereinsky's fight
against General Kornilov, the Lettish legions
played a very important part in suppressing the
rebel general. The same contingents went over
to the Bolsheviki after the fall of Kerensky, and
remained one of the mainstays of their rule.

In May, 1917, a congress of the Lettish socialist
party, the chief political organization among the
Letts, resolved that Lettonia should become an
autonomous part of a federated Russia. When
Russia concluded a separate peace at Brest-
Litovsk with the Central Powers, Germany, insti-
gated by the Teutonic barons, claimed the greater
part of Lettonia, to be set up under her protection,
and she got it. The Letts were to be divided
among Germany, Russia and perhaps Poland and
Lithuania. The various Lettish parties then
united and formed a national council, which issued
the following remarkably vigorous proclamation,
setting forth Lettonia 's claims and rights :

"The Lettish nation, trusting in the victory of
human justice and right, has paid a heavy sacri-
fice in blood and treasure in its tenacious struggle
against German attempts at the conquest and en-
slavement of nations. Notwithstanding all this,
the enemy troops succeeded, in February, 1918, in
occupying the whole of Latvia (Lettonia). Her
virile economic progress has been ruthlessly im-

152 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

peded, her vigorous intellectual life interrupted,
and her productive farms and rich cities laid waste
by fire.

' ' About 70 per cent, of the inhabitants of Latvia
have left their homes either voluntarily or under
compulsion, and they are now, for the most part,
living in the vastnesses of Russia as refugees. Of
the 800,000 inhabitants of Courland alone only
210,000 are still in territory temporarily in Ger-
man occupation, and of the 550,000 inhabitants of
Riga only 200,000 remain under the German yoke.

"The Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty dealt a still
heavier blow to Latvia. In accordance with this
so-called peace treaty, Courland and Riga, to-
gether with its district, have been constituted Ger-
man protectorates ; the remaining parts of Livonia
inhabited by Letts — that is, the districts of Wen-
den, Wolmar and Walk — are to be subject to Ger-
man occupation until peace and order are restored
in agreement with the wishes of the local popula-
tion, whilst the Lettish province of Patgale has
been separated from those cited above. Thus, the
Lettish countries, peopled by one nation and pos-
sessing a common civilization and similar political
and economic aims, are split up into three separate
parts, between two different States, and are sub-
jected to two totally different political regimes.
The Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty is an outrageous
act of violence which directly threatens and aims
at threatening the national, political and economic

i

LETTONIA 153

existence oi" Latvia, and is one of the greatest
crimes against civilization. Further, it is in direct
contradiction to the principles of democracy and
the right of self-determination as proclaimed by
Germany herself before the conclusion of the
treaty.

*' Latvia has no political or national aims, no
economic or cultural interests in common with
Germany. Belying solely on their present mili-
tary strength, the occupying authorities are doing
everything in their power to impose upon Latvia
German imperialism and militarism, and Latvia
is already threatened with the fate of Posen and
Alsace-Lorraine. Neither the Letts who have re-
mained at home nor those who have returned to
their country, or are still war refugees in chaotic
Eussia, have the slightest desire for annexation of
Latvia by Germany.

''With the object of giving to their acts of vio-
lence an appearance of legality and morality the
German authorities immediately set about the cre-
ation of the so-called Landesrats for each of these
provinces of Latvia. Their members consist of
chairmen of rural district councils and mayors ap-
pointed by the Germans, and of representatives of
the German nobility. These bodies lay claim truly
to represent and speak on behalf of Lettish politi-
cal aspirations when making their decisions. The
Landesrats are usurping the rights of the inhabi-
tants of Latvia and speak solely in their own

154 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

names when they favor the annexation of Latvia
to Germany. The Landesrats created by the oc-
cupational authorities have neither moral nor legal
right to speak of or to decide questions concern-
ing Latvia in the name of the Lettish nation. The
Letts foi*m eighty per cent, of the inhabitants of
Latvia as compared with seven per cent, of Ger-
mans, and yet the Letts have a very small number
of representatives in the Landesrats, fully two-
thirds of the members of which are of German
nationality, and of this two- thirds majority by
far the greater number belong to the German no-
bility, which is also the landed proprietor class.
As an instance of the respect which the Landes-
rats of the German nobility pay to Latvia's inter-
ests and aspirations may be cited their resolution
to hand over Courland with all her treasure, and
after all the sacrifices and blood of her sons, to
the uses of German imperialism, while an instance
of what understanding they have of the needs of
the toiling people is afforded by a speech made in
Berlin by the Reverend Bernewitz, a member of
the Courland Landesrat and Superintendent of the
Church of Courland, who stated that the soil of
Courland was crying out for German colonists.
At the present time 70 per cent, of Latvia's rural
population are deprived of their own holdings for
which they have long been, and are still, strug-
gling.

' ' On 8 March, 1918, the Landesrat of Courland

LETTONIA 155

resolved to re-establish the Duchy of Courland
and offered her crown to the Hohenzollem
dynasty. On 12 April the representatives of Riga,
together with the united Landesrats of Livonia,
Esthonia and the Island of Oesel, resolved to
create a Baltic monarchy, and again, in this in-
stance, her crown was offered to the German Em-
peror, who, in his capacity of King of Prussia, was
to create a personal union between the kingdom
of Prussia and the Baltic State. The German Gov-
ernment has now issued orders for a military and
economic convention to be concluded between Ger-
many and the Duchy of Courland.

''The geographical position of Latvia on the
shores of the Baltic renders the question of Latvia
one of international importance. It has not been
solved by the Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty, and it
cannot be solved by the Landesrats set up by the
German authorities. It will have to be solved in
conjunction with the Lettish nation and in ac-
cordance with the interests of present-day civiliza-
tion at the General Peace Conference.

''On 4 April the Lettish National Council, which
unites all the Lettish political parties, central com-
munal institutions and public organizations, with
the exception of the extreme Bolsheviks and a
handful of Germanophile monarchists, addressed
an energetic protest to the German Imperial
Chancellor, Count Hertling. A similar protest
was sent to Count Hertling and to the Commander

156 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

of the 8th German Army by the Provincial Council
of Livonia, but so far the German Government has
chosen to maintain silence with regard to the mat-
ter.

**A11 Lettish political parties without exception
are united in the irreducible demand for the in-
tegrity and indivisibility of the territories of Lat-
via. At this fateful moment the Lettish National
Council considers it to be its sacred duty to ad-
dress to all nations and their governments its
energetic protest against any attempt to partition
Latvia's territories and against all the forgeries
committed by the Landesrats. Simultaneously the
Lettish National Council respectfully submits the
following resolutions passed by it to all Allied
and neutral governments : —

''(1) The Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty of 3
March, 1918, by which an attempt was made to par-
tition Latvia, represents an act of violence against
the right of nations to self-determination (which
right was recognized in Germany as a basis of the
said treaty prior to its conclusion), and the said
treaty must therefore be declared null and void.

*'(2) The Lettish National Council denounces
the decisions of the Landesrats as acts of political
forgery..

**(3) The Lettish National Council is opposed
to the annexation of Latvia to Germany, and also
to any personal union with the kingdom of Prus-
sia.

LETTONIA 157

*'(4) The Lettish National Council announces
that any military and economic conventions, if any
such be concluded between Germany and the
Landesrats in Latvia, are hereby declared null
and void by Latvia and the Letts.

''(5) The Lettish National Council protests
against the curtailment of the freedom of the
press, the right of free speech, of assemblies and
all kinds of communication, of the suspension of
personal rights and the illegal appointment by
the occupational authorities of magistrates both
in town and country districts throughout the whole
of Latvia.

" (6) The Lettish National Council considers it-
self as the supreme representative authority for
Latvia until war refugees have returned, and un-
til the political constitution of Latvia is finally de-
cided.

'' (7) The Lettish National Council demands an
independent and integral State of Latvia, to in-
clude all Lettish countries, secured by interna-
tional guarantees. ' '

The above-quoted document shows exactly
where the Lettish people stood in their relation
to Germany. And yet upon the collapse of the lat-
ter, the efforts made by the Letts to regain their
land were thwarted for a time by the Allies, un-
doubtedly because of a misunderstanding of the
Lettish problem. The government of the German
barons, which had been sustained up to November

158 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

11, 1918, by Prussian bayonets, appealed to the
Allies for support. Unfortunately Great Britain
sent a fleet to Riga in response to their appeals.
This threw the Lettish people straight into the
arms of Bolshevist Russia, and with the co-opera-
tion of Russian forces they drove the foreigners
out of their country and occupied Riga.

It would be nothing short of a moral disaster
for the Allies to lend aid to the small group of
Teuton landowners who had exploited Lettonia
for centuries. Whatever the political views of the
Letts, they are entitled to their country and cannot
conceivably be turned over again to their oppres-
sors. The Lettish peasants should, by all means,
be provided with sufficient land to allow them to
live and develop as freemen. As to the future in-
ternational status of Lettonia, there are several
possible solutions. There is a Polish clique which
aims to create a union of all the small Baltic states,
to be dominated by a Greater Poland, for the sake
of cutting Russia off from the Baltic. The Teu-
tonic nobility of Lettonia would place the country
under the protectorate of an imperial Prussia. A
section of Lettish opinion favors a union with
Lithuania. Another section favors the establish-
ment of an independent, sovereign Lettish state.
However, the majority of the Letts were for mak-
ing Lettonia an autonomous unit of an all-Russian
democratic federation, realizing that the powerful

LETTONIA 159

Russian nation to the east was badly in need of
the Baltic ports and would ultimately regain them
by force if not given access to it by their holders,
chiefly the Letts and the Esths.

^TOCKHOLM ^0lP

^0
)THLAND

[Lake
?eipus

,f^

t(

tiB>*l/'*(CM_ii_ii_i(_ii_irii'"

1 \?

ethnographic boundaries of Lithuania, Lettonia, Esthonia and Finland.

VIII
ESTHONIA

The Esths inhabit the former Russian province
of Esthland and the northern part of the province
of Livonia, as well as the islands of the Moon
Sound and some adjoining sections of the prov-
inces of Petrograd and Pskov. Esthonia, there-
fore, lies on the Baltic, its northern boundary be-
ing the Gulf of Finland. In the south it adjoins
Lettonia. In the east it touches the western side
of Lake Peipus. The population of Esthonia is
approximately a million and a half. Nine-tenths
of the inhabitants are Esthonians.

The Esthonians, or Esths, are of Mongolian ori-
gin and belong to the Finnish family. By religion
they are closely connected with the Letts, both na-
tionalities professing Lutheranism. They differ,
however, from their southern neighbors in every-
thing else, language, physical appearance and cul-
ture. The Esthonians and their northern kindred,
the Finns, have much in common historically and
physically. Their forefathers were a race of war-
riors of whom the Baltic seamen were afraid. In
the twelfth century a Danish king attempted to

163

164 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

subdue them. He invaded their country and
forced them to adopt Christianity. They resumed
their heathenism, however, as soon as the Scandi-
navian invaders departed. In 1219 another Danish
king, Waldemar II, was more successful in intro-
ducing Christianity into Esthonia, but after his
death the Esths revolted and caused his successors
so miich trouble that Denmark sold the conquered
portion of Esthonia to the Livonian Order of the
Knights of the Sword who had already conquered
Lettonia and the southern section of Esthonia.

After that the fate of the Esthonians was very
similar to that of the Letts. Both were subjected
by the Teutons and oppressed cruelly. It was this
brotherhood in bondage that created the ties of in-
timate relationship now existing between the Letts
and Esths, in spite of their racial difference. The
two underwent the same treatment at the hands of
the German nobility who form even now only two
and a half per cent, of the Esthonian population.
They reduced the peasants to a condition of virtual
serfdom by controlling nearly all of the tillable
land. In 1521 Esthonia came under Sweden's rule,
which stimulated the development of the country
and improved the condition of the peasants. Two
hundred years later, in 1721, Esthonia was ceded
to Russia by the Peace of Nystad. Alexander I
abolished, in 1817, the institution of serfdom, guar-
anteeing the peasants the right of property, but

ESTHONIA 165

the German landlords distorted the law and re-
duced it to nothing.

The clergy, which is related by blood to the Teu-
tonic aristocracy, cooperated with the latter in
keeping the Esthonians in a state of submission.
''If you are made a slave," read a typical proc-
lamation of the priests to the Esthonian peasants
in 1816, ' ' serve with pleasure, and remember that
it is not for everybody to be a master. One has
received a great honor, another quite a small one.
Do not be ashamed of rendering forced labor.
When you do what you are commanded to do, you
get honor enough from so doing. Remember
Jesus, who obeyed and humbled himself even unto
death. Do not despise your superiors, and when
they are mistaken, remember that they, too, are
men. Perform your forced labor and pay your
taxes willingly."

But the oppression of the masters was so merci-
less that the Esthonians revolted in 1859. The
rising was suppressed and the German landlords
continued to exploit, with the help of the Russian
authorities, the peasants. These Germans were
the embodiment of all that was cruel in both the
Teuton and Russian governing classes. Of them
Bismarck said in 1867: ''It is a generally recog-
nized truth that the German who has become a
Russian is worse than the Russian himself. The
Russian steals because of immediate necessity, but
when the German steals, he thinks of the future. ' '

166 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

In the last forty years a campaign of Russifica-
tion was inaugurated and carried on in Esthonia
by the Tsar's government. Having clung to their
tongue for more than six centuries under the Teu-
tonic barons, the Esths were not to be Russified so
easily. The efforts of the Russian authorities only
stimulated them to revive their own language, pos-
sessed of literary and poetical qualities, and cul-
tivate it more assiduously than ever. ' ' They have
a decided love of poetry, ' ' writes Prince Peter A.
Kropotkin, ''and exhibit great facility in impro-
vising verses and poems on all occasions, and they
sing everywhere from morning till night. Like the
Finns, they possess rich stores of national songs."
The latter were collected and published under the
name of "Kalevi Poeg," bearing a striking re-
semblance to Finland 's great national epic, the Ka-
levala.

The Esthonian literary revival entailed, of
course, the growth of a national movement. The
commercial development of the region, which as-
sumed considerable importance as a gateway from
Russia to the West, made for prosperity and the
rise of a middle-class. Like Lettonia, Esthonia
was the scene of a violent revolutionary outbreak
in 1905, due to the same causes and resulting in
the same fearful measures of repression. After
the successful revolution of 1917, Esthonia was
granted by the Russian Provisional Government
a national diet, which was elected in July of that

ESTHONIA 167

year by universal suffrage and on the basis of
proportional representation. It met in Keval and
after a short struggle succeeded in wresting pow-
er from the baronial Landtags. After the over-
throw of the Provisional Government by the Bol-
sheviki the diet proclaimed Esthonia's indepen-
dence. A National Assembly met in January,
1918, and declared Esthonia a neutral country.
It rejected the proposal of the Teutonic nobility
to ask for German protection in the following reso-
lution :

''AH the political parties of Esthonia affirm that
the Esthonian people in its entirety is opposed
to the occupation of Esthonia by German troops
and sees in such occupation a most cruel violation
of its national sovereign rights. At the same time
the whole nation wishes that all foreign troops
be at once removed from Esthonian territory. ' '

However, the nobles knew that their end was
certain, unless the Germans came to their sup-
port. They therefore addressed a petition to Ger-
many, inviting it to occupy Esthonia. The invita-
tion was promptly accepted, the diet and Estho-
nian Provisional Government were suppressed,
the reforms that were inaugurated were revoked,
and the small group of Junkers, leaning on Ger-
man troops, proceeded to restore the cruel rule of
the days of Tsarism. The Esthonian language
was prohibited, the press crushed, political activity
suppressed. German mayors and governors were

168 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

appointed in place of those elected by the Estho-
nians. The nobility even started a reign of White
Terror against the revolutionary working classes.

"The representatives of the Esthonian Provi-
sioial Government in Stockholm on July 3, 1918, is-
sued a strongly-worded protest against the bar-
baric German oppression," according to A. Piip.
"This was not the first protest published by the
Esthonians, as protests were issued against the
right of the German barons to appeal for German
troops to occupy the country, and also repudiating
the right of the Landtags of nobility to speak on
behalf of the Esthonian people. Protest was fur-
ther made against the decision of the United
Landesrat to ask for personal union with Prussia.
The Esthonians have nothing in common, politic-
ally, with Germany; they desire neither annexa-
tion nor personal union ; they claim their right to
be independent, to be free of German domination,
and also to be dissociated from the anarchic policy
of the Great-Russians, Esthonia strongly pro-
tests against the violation of international laws,
and even the restrictions of the Brest-Litovsk
Treaty are ignored."

The Esthonian Provisional Government ap-
pealed for recognition to the Allies in the spring
of 1918. The British Secretary of State for For-
eign Affairs, Arthur J. Balfour, replied on May 3,
as follows :

ESTHONIA 169

"His Majesty's Government greet with sympa-
thy the aspirations of the Esthonian people, and
are glad to reaffirm their readiness to grant pro-
visional recognition to the Esthonian National
Council as a de facto independent body until the
Peace Conference, when the future status of Estho-
nia ought to be settled as far as possible in accord-
ance with the wishes of the population. It would
obviously be impossible for His Majesty's govern-
ment at the present time to guarantee to Estho-
nia the right to participate at the Peace Confer-
ence, but at any such conference His Majesty's
government will do their utmost to secure that the
above principle is applied to Esthonia. ' '

Recognition was also extended to the Esthonian
National Council by the French and Italian gov-
ernments. While this was occurring, Esthonia, it
should be remembered, was under the control of
a German force. The National Council and its
representatives in the Allied countries had no
power in Esthonia. Besides, it was elected during
Iverensky's rule and represented an alignment of
forces which, according to the claims of Estho-
nian labor leaders, underwent a great change in
subsequent months.

When Germany surrendered to the Allies, the
Esthonian nobility was confronted with the same
situation as the Lettonian aristocracy. Both were
of Teutonic origin. But there were two added ele-
ments in the Esthonian problem. First, its racial

170 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

community with Finland, where a semi-military
government fmictioned. Second, the bonds that
existed between Sweden and certain elements of
the Esthonian middle and upper class. The Es-
thonian people were anxious to free themselves
of their yoke, but discovered that the Allies had
asked Germany to keep its troops in the Baltic
provinces as a police force. This was a shock to
the Esths, and many of them swung toward Bol-
shevist Russia, asking Moscow for support. On
the other hand, the upper and middle classes sent
out urgent appeals for aid to the Allies, to Swe-
den and the Finnish government. England sent a
few warships to Reval, the Esthonian port, while
Sweden and Finland despatched military expedi-
tions to help the Esthonian bourgeoisie in its fight
against the Esthonian proletariat which had ob-
tained Bolshevist support.

The outcome of the struggle will depend on what |
will have transpired in Lettonia and Finland. The
former had early in January, 1919, been captured
by the Lettish-Bolshevist forces. If Finland's mil-
itary government were to meet the same fate as
that of the German baronial government of Let-
tonia, then Esthonia would be unable to maintain
its middle-class government. Such a solution
would place Esthonia 's international status in the
same position as that of Lettonia, i.e., autonomous
national existence within the ranks of an all-Rus-

ESTHONIA 171

sian federation of states. Otherwise, it is con-
ceivable that Esthonia would conclude an alliance
with either Sweden or Finland, or both, and sever
all connections with Russia.

IX

FINLAND

Finland was one of the few subject countries
in Europe before the outbreak of the Great War
in 1914 which always attracted considerable at-
tention abroad. In a very large measure it was
due to Finland 's high state of culture and its con-
stitutional rights. The civilized world was aware
that historically, ethnically and culturally Finland
was a national entity for itself, entitled to the
free development of its spiritual and economic
resources.

Because of Finland's geographical position
mainly, there is a mistaken general belief that the
Finns are racially related to the Scandinavian
peoples. The fact is that the Finns are a branch
of the Mongolian race, and belong to the Finno-
Ugrian linguistic family. There are numerous
Finno-Ugrian tribes all over northern Russia.
Large numbers of these Finns have been assimi-
lated by the Russians. However, the inhabitants
of Finland developed along individual lines, in-
dependent of their eastern relatives. As early
as the seventh century the ancestors of the present

172

FINLAND 173

Finns invaded the peninsular Baltic territory
which is bounded on the south by the Gulf of Fin-
land and on the west by the Gulf of Bothnia. It
was a marshy land, dotted with innumerable lakes.
From the nature of the country the Finns got
their native name — Suomilaiset — which translated
into English means — ''the people of the fens."

Christianity was first introduced into Finland
about 1157, when King Eric IX of Sweden in-
vaded the country, accompanied by a bishop and a
number of priests, who remained in Finland to
convert its inhabitants to Christianity. However,
the Finlanders did not take quickly to the new
faith and Sweden had to conquer the country again
in the thirteenth century, in the course of which
the Finns were Christianized and Finland com-
pletely subjugated by the Swedes. In 1293 the
Swedish ruler, Porgils Knutsson, extended his
power as far east as Viborg, which he founded.
This brought him into conflict with the Russians.
Later the Swedes pushed on farther eastward, but
were unable to retain their hold. In the fourteenth
century Finland was recognized as a dominion
of Sweden, and the latter set itself to civili^ie the
Finns. The Swedish language and Swedish laws
and arts were introduced into the country, but the
Finns were treated as equals by the Swedes, so
that Finland really owes to Sweden its high state
of civilization. A court of appeal was established
in Finland in 1623 and a university founded in

174 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

1640. The justice with which Sweden governed
Finland led to happy relations between the two
peoples. Intermarriage was free, resulting in the
course of many centuries in a considerable blend-
ing of both races. Yet, nevertheless, the Finnish
peasants continued to speak their own tongue, al-
though the upper classes and all the governmental
institutions used Swedish. Early in the sixteenth
century the Lutheran Church was established in
Finland and in the beginning of the seventeenth
century Gustavus Adolphus granted a diet to the
Finns, composed of representatives of four es-
tates, nobility, clergy, townsmen and peasants.
Learning was encouraged and printing was fos-
tered by the Swedish governors. Thus, when the
university was founded by Governor Per Brahe,
he urged Swedish professors to study Finnish,
which, he said, ''does not lack a certain elegance
in its construction and does honor to the coun-
try."

In the course of the seventeenth century Fin-
land was visited by terrible pestilences, accom-
panied by famine. The country had been impov-
erished during the Thirty Years' War, and with
the subsequent decline of Sweden, it became the
battlefield for contending armies. Already Peter
the Great, who built St. Petersburg, launched his
policy of Russian expansion along the Baltic.
From 1710 to 1721 the Russian armies gradually
penetrated and occupied aU Finland, By the

FINLAND 175

Peace of Nystad, of 1721, Sweden ceded to Russia
the southeastern corner of Finland. When the
Russians withdrew and the refugees began to re-
turn, they found, according to one historian, ''the
roads destroyed, the bridges broken, no horses,
no food, the whole country a desert. The houses
were either burned down or roofless and window-
less, their contents sacked; the wells were filled
up with earth, the ploughlands were overgrown
with forests, birds had their nests in the aban-
doned churches. The university was closed be-
tween 1710 and 1722, and other important institu-
tions suffered acutely during the same period."

Finland's recuperative powers were, however,
so great as to restore normal conditions in a brief
time. Peace did not last long in Finland after
1721. The Swedes made an effort to regain the
territory conquered by Peter the Great, but failed
miserably, so that they were even compelled to
cede some more Finnish territory to Russia in
1743. This dismemberment of Finland, due to
Sw^edish weakness, roused in the Finns a national
spirit. It was natural for them to develop a sense
of independence, as the power of Sweden de-
creased and that of Russia grew. The Finnish
national movement may therefore be said to date
from the eighteenth century, although it did not
attain its climax till a centuiy later. This move-
ment first aimed at the liberation of the Finns
from the cultural Swedish domination. The Fin-

176 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

nish language, which is totally foreign to the
Swedish, but which had been suppressed, was now
revived and propagated. The first known writer
in Finnish was Michael Agricola, who published a
number of books, including the first Finnish trans-
lation of the New Testament, about the middle of
the sixteenth century. For two hundred years
afterwards Swedish was the dominant literary
tongue of the country. However, toward the end
of the eighteenth century a Finnish scholar, Hen-
rik Porthan, initiated a movement for the study
of Finnish history and philology, inspiring several
young followers to lead in the resurrection of Fin-
nish culture.

The Swedish monarchs fought for the recon-
quest of the parts of Finland captured by Russia.
They were not successful in their attempts, suc-
ceeding only in devastating and impoverishing
Finnish lands. In 1808-9, a great struggle between
Sweden and Russia developed. The Finns, recog-
nizing Sweden's impotence, accepted the offer
made by Alexander I of Russia to enter the Rus-
sian empire as an autonomous grand duchy. A
diet met in Finland to pass upon the proposal,
and agreed to become part of Russia on condition
that Alexander I solemnly recognize the Finnish
Constitution, and pledge himself to preserve Fin-
land's religion, laws and liberties. The Russian
emperor personally attended the diet and con-
firmed the Finnish Constitution. He was greeted

FINLAND 177

as the Grand Duke of Finland and won the grati-
tude of the Finns. The Russians created a Fin-
nish Senate, for administrative and judicial pur-
poses. A Eussian Secretary of State for Finland
was appointed by Alexander. The secretary was
Russia's famous Liberal statesman of that time,
Speransky. On March 15-27, 1809, Alexander is-
sued, while at Borga, the following proclamation,
which, together with another manifesto issued
later, formed the charter of Finland's autonomy:

* ' We, Alexander the First, by the Grace of God
Emperor and Autocrat of All the Russians, etc., do
make known : —

''That Providence having placed us in posses-
sion of the Grand Duchy of Finland, we have de-
sired hereby to confirm and ratify the religion
and fundamental Laws of the Land as well as the
privileges and rights which each class in the said
Grand Duchy in particular, and all the inhabitants
in general, be their position high or low, have
hitherto enjoyed according to the Constitution.
We promise to maintain all these benefits and
laws firm and unshakable in their full force. In
confirmation whereof we have signed this Act of
Assurance with Our own hand."

When Russia took over Finland, the province of
Viborg, previously annexed by Russia, was re-
united with its mother-country. Speransky or-
ganized the Grand Duchy, writing to the Emperor
at the conclusion of his labors: "Finland is a

178 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

State, not a province." Up to 1863 Finland's diet
was not convoked again, its constitution making
no provision for the regular meeting of the as-
sembly. It was Alexander II, the Liberator, who
summoned the representatives of the Finnish Es-
tates. It was also he who promulgated a separate
money system for Finland. When in 1873 Russia
adopted the universal military service law, at-
tempts were made by its sponsors to include the
Finns in the Russian Army. However, Alexander

II held that it was for the Finnish diet to make
provisions for an army in Finland, which it did.

With the accession to the throne of Alexander

III the reactionary and extreme nationalist Rus-
sian elements had their sway, and they found de-
tached Finland a stumbling-block in their Pan-
Slavic plans. Finland had to be Russified, such
Avas the view of those imperialists. A campaign
was begun by the Russian government in 1890, in-
tended to wipe out gradually the autonomous Fin-
nish departments. Many ordinances were passed
suspending Finnish laws. Finally a crisis was
reached in 1899, when Governor-General Bobrikov,
in addressing the Finnish diet on behalf of the
Tsar, spoke of the Finns as of Russian subjects
and denied the diet's right to legislate for Finland.
A new military law was proposed, whereby the
Finnish army was to be dissolved and the Fin-
nish soldiers incorporated in Russian units. Of
course, the diet was unwilling to give its consent

FINLAND 179

to the bill. General Bobrikov then produced a
manifesto from the Tsar, which in etfect nullified
Finland's constitution wherever the empire's in-
terests were concerned.

As Finland's struggle for its constitutional
rights was opening with this notorious manifesto,
it may be pertinent to review the internal social
activities of the country during the nineteenth cen-
tury. When Finland entered the Russian empire
in 1809, it also entered upon a century of peace,
prosperity and intense cultural development.
Having freed itself from the Swedish governmen-
tal domination through its joining of Russia, the
Finns still found themselves in the grip of Swedish
rule. All the administrative offices were held by
Swedes or Finns who had become Swedes; all
business was transacted in the Swedish language,
the literature of the country was Swedish. The na-
tional movement therefore raised the banner of
the revival of the Finnish language. ' ^ We are not
Swedes, we don't want to become Russians, let us
then be Finns," was the motto devised by a Fin-
nish publicist. It was taken up by a group of
young intellectuals, who became enamored of
their country's "singularly rich and beauitiful
tongue, " as a student of Finland puts it ; " doctors
and professors, visiting the people in lonely set-
tlements, far up the lakes, or on the fringe of
the vast Karelian forests, found them in posses-
sion of a wide store of legends, the strangest myth-

180 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ology, and a fine and complex poetical form. The
Finnish people began to think of their country as
'Suomi,' something utterly distinct from Sweden
or Russia, having a language of its own."

However, the Fimiish language was so back-
ward a vehicle for expression in the early part of
the eighteenth century that the first ideas of
Finnish nationalism met with scorn and ridicule
on the part of the educated classes. ' ' To the aris-
tocratic Swede, living the life of a country gentle-
man, ' ' writes Arthur Reade, * ' the talk of Finnish
nationalists seemed at first utterly absurd and
later on almost impious. The idea that the stolid-
looking and rather unkempt Finn who worked on
his estate and spoke a barbarous-sounding lan-
guage should aspire to a practical equality with a
race boasting a polished and ancient culture and
an honorable name in history seemed preposter-
ous. The Finns were regarded as ugly and stupid.
When they desired Finnish to be the language of
instruction in the schools, the Swedes replied that
one simply could not imagine instruction being
conveyed in so gross a tongue. The idea of a
literature in Finnish seemed equally grotesque.
No educated person would ever employ such a lan-
guage. As to Finnish being used as the official
language, this was pure madness."

To a considerable degree this was true a century
ago. The man mostly. responsible for the evolu-
tion of a Finnish literary tongue, thus furnishing

FINLAND 181

the backbone for the nationalist movement, was
Elias Lonnrot. Born in 1802, a poet by nature, he
early devoted himself to the collection of Finnish
folk-poetry. For nearly twenty years he jour-
neyed into the remotest corners of his country,
gathering material for a national epic. The fruit
of his labors was the famous "Kalevala," Fin-
land 's Homer, and one of the finest poetical treas-
ures in the literature of the world. Around Lonn-
rot gathered the leaders of the rising generation.
In 1854 he was prevailed upon to become profes-
sor of Finnish at the Helsingf ors University. Ten
years previous, however, the first Finnish periodi-
cal had already made its appearance, laying the
foundation for the Fennoman (Finnish-Finn), as
opposed to the Svekoman (Swedish-Finn), party.
The country was thus divided into two camps.
The Fennoman element had a hard uphill fight to
make, as it was feared that the cultural isolation
of Finland from both Eussia and Sweden would
prove harmful to it. But the nationalists soon
obtained the support of Russia. Alexander II,
after having received the leader of the Fennoman
movement, Snellman, issued a rescript which made
Finnish the equal of the Swedish language. This
was really interference with the prerogatives of
the Finnish diet, but it was brought about by the
Finns themselves.

The language-conflict, however, was more than
that. It was not only a racial and cultural strug-

182 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

gle between Finns and Swedes, but also an eco-
nomic struggle between the labor class, almost ex-
clusively Finnish, and the commercial and aris-
tocratic classes, largely Swedish. This is why the
imperial rescript of Alexander II did not settle
the contest, as economic conditions were favorable
toward its perpetuation. However, the Finns ob-
tained the upper hand, mainly because the major-
ity of the people were pure Finns.

When Russia embarked upon its policy of Rus-
sification in Finland, the Fennoman and Svekoman
elements united to oppose the designs of Tsarism.
Governor-General Bobrikov initiated a cam-
paign of terrorization which reduced Finland's
autonomy virtually to nothing. A Russian bu-
reaucracy was planted and cultivated by Bobrikov
and the Russian language was foisted on the em-
bittered Finns. All the petitions and protests of
the oppressed race were in vain. A national ad-
dress to the emperor was secretly got up, to urge
upon the Tsar the restoration of the constitution.
It was an amazing revelation of Finnish national
solidarity. More than half a million signatures
were collected in ten days, every adult citizen, ir-
respective of sex, being permitted to sign. This
enormous collection is still preserved. A deputa-
tion was quietly sent with the address to present
it to the Tsar, but he refused to grant an audience.

While thus striving legally to regain their con-
stitutional rights, the Finns also embarked upon

FINLAND 183

a clandestine revolutionary movement which, of
course, was confined to the working and intellec-
tual classes only. The first Socialist party ap-
peared in Finland in 1899. It fought not only for
freedom from Russian autocratic domination, but
also for internal reforms. The assassination in
1903 of Governor Bobrikov was an act which natur-
ally met with the approval of nearly all the popu-
lar elements of the country. The conservatives,
however, did not look with favor upon the agita-
tion of the Finnish Socialists for the revision of
the Constitution, — an antiquated bill of rights of
Swedish origin, antedating the French Revolution.
The Finnish diet was still based on the four es-
tates, being in fact a combination of a house of
nobility, a house of clergy, a house of burghers,
and a house of landed peasantry. The laborers,
whether in town or country, had no representation
in it.

The revolutionary year of 1905, which shook all
Russia, stirred Finland profoundly. A general
strike, simultaneous with the great Russian strike,
gripped Finland in the fall of that year. It was a
purely revolutionary affair. All public life was
paralyzed. All means of communication, includ-
ing postal and telegraph service, were suspended.
The cities were without electricity. Shops, faC'
tories, schools were universally closed, with the ex-
ception of food stores. The Tsar, bowing before
the spontaneous demonstration of popular feeling,

184 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

restored the Constitution and repealed all the il-
legal ordinances. With the external yoke re-
moved, class strife assumed larger proportions
and a deeper meaning. The labor element won the
fight for a new constitution and an electoral system
was promulgated which provided for universal
adult suffrage, regardless of sex, and for propor-
tional representation. The first popular diet met
in 1907. There were eighty Socialists in this as-'
sembly, which comprised a total of two hundred
deputies. There were nineteen women members.
The extent of Socialist influence came as a rev-
elation to the middle and upper classes. These
clung to their places in the governmental ma-
chineiy, especially since the municipal forms of
government had not been modernized. The old
fight between Fennoman and Svekoman was re-
newed as a struggle between labor and capital. In
spite of this Finland prospered, progressing politi-
cally, economically and spiritually.

But reaction meanwhile raised its head in Rus-
sia. Following the revolution of 1905, the Russian
autocracy resumed its policy of terrorization of its
subject nationalities. There began in Finland
what has been called ''the second period of Rus-
sianization. " Indeed, for a while it seemed in-
congruous that within a few miles from the seat
of Tsardom, there should function an autonomous
democracy so radical in its convictions. The Rus-
sian bureaucrats could get along with the Finnish

FINLAND 185

bureaucracy, as their identity of interests had been
emphasized by the events of 1905 ; but how could
they ever tolerate a diet virtually dominated by
Socialists? Besides, Russia was entertaining de-
signs on some Scandinavian warm- water port, as
those of Eussia were frozen the greater part of
the year. It was necessary to Russianize Finland
in order to lay the groundwork for a railway sys-
tem there, pointing menacingly toward some Nor-
wegian harbor. The Finnish diet became the first
target of the Tsar's authorities. It was dissolved
several times, and the emperor consistently vetoed
all its bills, thus rendering them void. Every new
election yielded a larger Socialist force in the
Diet, provoking the imperial government further.
In 1908 Premier Stolypin, later assassinated in a
theatre in the presence of the Tsar, proclaimed be-
fore the Duma that Finland's autonomy was not
legislative, but local. He then proceeded to get
the Tsar's assent to a proposal to empower the
Russian Council of Ministers to pass upon all
Finnish legislative and administrative affairs.
Finland's protests were in vain. On the recom-
mendation of the Russian Cabinet, the Tsar re-
jected practically all the laws promulgated by
the Finnish Diet. In 1910 the Russian Council of
Ministers appointed a commission which drew up
a proposal that virtually abolished the authority
of the Finnish Diet, making it a mere shell of a
legislative institution. This "program" was ac-

186 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

cepted by the reactionary Duma and later made
permanent. Western Europe was greatly agitated
over the Russian treatment of Finland. Large
sections of the British, French, German, Italian,
Belgian and Dutch parliaments addressed memo-
rials to the Duma, pointing out that the rights of
Finland's constitution were historical and indis-
putable. The imperial ''program" for Finland
was not pressed in its entirety, mainly because of
the commotion in Europe. A conference of inter-
national jurisconsults was held in 1910 ''to ex-
amine the relations between Finland and Russia."
It resolved that ' ' Finland has the right to demand
that the Russian empire should respect her con-
stitution." It had the effect of consolidating
European public opinion in favor of Finland.

It was not unnatural for the Finns to assume a
pro-German attitude upon the outbreak of the
Great War. They saw in the destruction or de-
feat of Russia their own deliverance. Unfortu-
nately, the Entente powers did not try to influence
the Tsar 's government to relax its oppressive hold
on the little northern country. The result was
that the middle and upper classes began to look
to Germany for the restoration of Finnish inde-
pendence. Thousands of them emigrated to Ger-
many and many thousands more entered the ranks
of the German armies to fight against Russia, pre-
paring the nucleus for a German-Finnish force to
attack the Russians from the rear. This alliance

FINLAND 187

between the Finnisli aristocracy and Germany
proved of very portentous significance after the
Russian Revolution.

In 1916 an election was held for the diet which
resulted in the Socialists gaining a majority over
the parties of the middle and upper classes. The
spread of Socialism in Finland was extraordinary,
embracing in its folds not only the industrial, but
also the agricultural workers. The Trade Union
membership alone reached seventy thousand, and
this in a country whose entire population hardly
approximated three million. Fourteen daily and
fifty other journals voiced the demands of Finnish
labor.

With the Russian Revolution came the revival
of Finnish nationalist and socialist activities. The
diet met in July, 1917, and declared itself in favor
of an independent Finland. The upper classes,
seeing in the establishment of Finnish independ-
ence a menace of socialism, assumed a pro-Russian
attitude and induced the Provisional Government
of Kerensky, who looked with apprehension at
Finland's declaration of independence at a time
when Russia was engaged in a life-and-death
struggle, to dissolve the diet by force. A provi-
sional government was then formed in Finland
opposed to the Socialists, but it was overthrown
by a rising of the workers, who were aided by the
Russian Bolsheviki, in January, 1918. Then fol-
lowed a bloody civil struggle between the hard

188 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

pressed White Guard and the victorious Red
Guard. The former appealed for help to Sweden
and then to Germany. ' ' The greatest aid the Ger-
mans gave us," read the statement of a Finnish
White Guard envoy in the United States, ''was in
scaring the Russian Bolsheviki. German inter-
vention gave our General Mannerheim the price-
less opportunity of organizing our armies, and
we were supplied with enough munitions. We
would never have appealed to the Germans if
Sweden had not turned us down when we asked
that country for arms. However, private firms in
Sweden did supply us with rifles and munitions."
The civil strife turned into a reign of hideous
terror on both sides. The Socialist government
was forced to flee into Russia. A part of its forces
joined the Allied expedition in the north, hojjing
in view of their opposition to the Finnish-German
rule to induce the Allies to intervene on their be-
half in Finland. Another part of the Socialists,
the more radical element, fled into Bolshevik Rus-
sia, pleading for Lenine's support. Meanwhile
the terror practiced by the White Guard in con-
junction with the Germans, ostensibly in retalia-
tion for the preceding reign of the Red Guard, at-
tracted world-wide attention. The bitterness of
the White Terror must be ascribed not only to the
Germans, but also to the fact that the ruling class
in Finland is of foreign, Swedish origin. Accord-
ing to the Scandinavian correspondent of the Chi-

FINLAND 189

cago Daily News, the Whites adopted the German
exploitation of war prisoners as slaves, ''with the
difference that the Finns were penalizing their
own fellow-countrymen, a proceeding without pre-
cedent in modern times. ' ' More than seven thou-
sand Reds were tried in the Tammerfors Court
and, branded as criminals, they were offered at
wholesale to any farmer or contractor who applied
for them. Many more thousands of Finnish work-
ers were exported to Germany. The Finnish
White government even went as far as inviting
a German Prince to become King of Finland. But
German fortunes in the war suddenly took a dis-
astrous turn. The Whites thereupon proceeded to
flirt with the Allies and delegated their com-
mander, Mannerheim, to establish friendly rela-
tions with them. Both the Red and White govern-
ments established embassies abroad, attracting
public attention to their opposite claims. After
the collapse of the Central Powers, General Man-
nerheim succeeded in gaining British unofficial
recognition of the White Guard government. The
United States undertook to feed Finland.

The issue of the internal struggle in Finland
and the ultimate form of government there can-
not be doubted in view of the established fact that
more than half of Finland's population is iden-
tified with labor and socialistic movements. To-
ward the close of 1918 a national congress of Fin-
nish Socialists, excluding the Bolshevist faction,

190 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

urged that Finland should be a republic with all
legislative powers in the hands of a diet and with
a president elected by the diet every third year.

There can be no question as to the fitness of the
Finnish people to govern themslves. Finland has
the history of a parliamentary democracy back of
it. More than ninety per cent, of the Finns are
literate, and Finland boasts of a literature that is
second to none. By habit, outlook and aspiration,
the Finn is a cultured European, although of
Asiatic blood. Finland's natural resources are ex-
tensive. Sixty-three per cent, of its surface area
is covered with forests, and thanks to the coun-
try's numberless lakes and other waterways, Fin-
land should develop an enormous timber industry.
The reserves of granite in Finland are unparal-
leled in any other country. Finally, Finland is
beautiful, in fact the most beautiful northern coun-
try in the world, which in times of peace and pros-
perity ought to attract a large tourist trade.

Pakt II

THE RESURRECTED NATIONS
IN ASIA

ARABIA

Early in 1916 the world was startled by the re-
port that the Arabs, led by the Grand Shereef of
Mecca, revolted against the Turks and cleared the
northern part of the Arabian Red Sea littoral of
Ottoman troops. This was followed by reports
of a wide national movement in Arabia. A dec-
laration of independence was issued by the Grand
Shereef, proclaiming Arabia's separation from
Turkey. Then, when General Allenby undertook
his expedition into Syria, it became known that
an Arab force cooperated with the British army,
contributing considerably to the Turkish rout.

The Arabs of the fallen Turkish Empire inhabit
the vast territory lying between the Tigris and
the Persian Gulf on the east ; the Red Sea and the
Mediterranean on the west; the Arabian Sea on
the south, and Armenia and Kurdistan on the
north. About twelve million Arabs, divided into
innumerable tribes and sects, live here. Only
three sections of this territory have developed
sufficiently to claim national rights ; they are Syria,
Mesopotamia, and the Hejaz. Arabian national-

}93

194 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ism first manifested itself in Syria toward the end
of the nineteenth century in the form of a Pan-
Arabian movement. In 1895 an Arabian National
Committee, formed in Paris, issued a manifesto
which said, in part :

''The Arabs . . . are awakened to their his-
torical national and ethnographical homogeneous-
ness, and aim to separate themselves from the
Ottoman body and form an independent state.
This new Arabian state will be confined to its
natural boundaries, from the Tigris and the
Euphrates to the Suez Canal, and from the Medi-
terranean Sea to the Sea of Oman. It will be gov-
erned by a liberal constitutional monarchy of an
Arabian Sultan."

Various forces prevented the successful propa-
gation of Pan- Arabian nationalism. The policies
of the Great Powers in the Near East tended to
erect separate spheres of influence in the lands
populated by the Arab. France was interested in
Syria, especially in the Lebanon. Zionism strove
to restore Palestine to the Jews. Great Britain
was seeking to extend its influence over Mesopo-
tamia, in order to secure its Indian possessions
from German aggression by the way of the Ber-
lin-to-Bagdad railroad. The movement for an in-
dependent Arabia was thus confined to the isolated
province of the Hejaz, in which the holy cities of
Mecca and Medina are located. It was here that
rebellion against Turkey finally raised its head

ARABIA 195

and brought the problem of Arabia forcefully be-
fore the court of world opinion.

Premier Lloyd George announced on January
5th, 1918, a solution of the problem of nationality
in Turkey which explicitly recognized the claims
of the Arabs in West Arabia, Mesopotamia and
Syria. He said: "While we do not challenge the
maintenance of the Turkish Empire in the home-
lands of the Turkish race with its capital at Con-
stantinople— the passage between the Mediter-
ranean and the Black Sea being internationalized
and neutralized — Arabia, Armenia, Mesopotamia,
Syria and Palestine are in our judgment entitled
to a recognition of their separate national con-
ditions." This statement of the British Prime
Minister defined Arabia as a political term, com-
prehending the Hejaz and the adjoining provinces
only, and excluding Palestine, Syria and Meso-
potamia. And it is in this narrow sense that the
word Arabia is employed in these pages.

The Arabs are Semites, and their land is said
to have been the cradle of the Semitic race. It is
from Arabia that the early settlers of Babylonia,
Assyria and Palestine came. A thousand years
before the Christian era several kingdoms were
established in Arabia. At the time of the rise of
Islam the various Arabian lands were governed
by numerous chiefs. Many of the Arab tribes were
nomadic, wandering from one part of the country
to another. A number of Jewish tribes, appar-

196 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ently immigrants from Palestine, were found in
Arabia as early as the sixth century.

Mohammed appeared more than thirteen cen-
turies ago. He was bom in Mecca, but made his
capital Medina. It was from there that he started
the movement to introduce his creed into all
Arabian and non-Arabian lands. It is not gen-
erally realized that Mohammed's religious teach-
ing was closely identified with Arabian national-
ism. Arabia for the Arabs, was the watchword of
the Prophet. Around him gathered a party of
adherents who adopted his religion as well as his
national idea. He succeeded in capturing Mecca,
and this helped him greatly in extending his rule
over the neighboring lands. At his death Arabia
was a united country.

Mohammed's successor, Abu Bekr, was the first
to assume the title of Caliph. As such he continued
the Prophet's policy of spreading Islam and im-
posing it on the neighboring states, Persia and
Byzantium. At the same time, his domestic rule
was such as to consolidate the various tribes under
the banner of the Caliphate. By diverting their
attention to foreign lands he succeeded in pre-
serving peace among themselves. Omar, who fol-
lowed Abu Bekr, was perhaps the best tj'^pification
of a nationalist Caliph. Indeed, it was the main
task of his great career to establish a system of
government based on justice and to strengthen
the internal bonds that made for a strong Arabia.

ARABIA 197

Omar was, however, not only a brilliant ruler of
his country, but extremely successful as a Caliph,
carrying the wars that his predecessors had
launched to victorious conclusions. In his war
against the Byzantine Empire he invaded Syria,
capturing Damascus in 635 and Jerusalem in 636.
Four years later his armies conquered Egypt and
took Alexandria. Persia was completely overrun
by the Moslems during his rule. He even dis-
patched a fleet to the Abyssinian coast, to protect
the followers of Islam there, but it was wrecked,
and Omar never tried to build another in its
stead, although his successors did create an
Arabian navy.

The united Arabian state did not last long.
Arabia's sons spread out in every direction, build-
ing new cities and states in Egypt, Syria, Meso-
potamia, Persia, where they acquired wealth and
power. Wherever they settled, they established
Mohammedanism, sometimes after prolonged
struggles. While this was going on, feuds de-
veloped in Arabia proper, which weakened its
position as an active force in the propagation of
Mohammedanism. The center of Moslem life
shifted from Mecca and Medina, which w^ere too
remote from the then existing civilized world, to
various places in the conquered lands, as they at-
tained in turn their maximum of power. The Cali-
phate went where Islam flourished, changing in the
course of centuries several seats. Arabia still re-

198 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

mained the holy land, the birthplace and grave of
the Prophet, and as such it attracted enormous
numbers of pilgrims annually, who brought with
them wealth to the country. But Arabia ceased to
be a living power in Islam. It lost its prestige as
a strong national entity, and gradually declined as
a state. Protection, however, had to be accorded
the vast gatherings from all over the world that
poured into the sacred Mohammedan cities. It
was this that gave birth to the Shereefate of
Mecca. There were numerous descendants of the
Prophet in Mecca and Medina. This posterity be-
came a sort of nobility, the head of each family
bearing the name of ' ' Sharif, ' ' which, in Arabian,
means "the noble." Several of these families be-
came powerful about 1000 A. D., and from 1200
one house of descendants from Ali, the nephew of
Mohammed, managed to keep itself in office. The
ruling Shereef is addressed by his people, "Our
Master," and is virtually a king, provided he is
capable of extending his domain over the turbu-
lent tribes in the vicinity. The Shereefs have not
always been able to control Medina, to safeguard
the routes along which the pilgrims came to the
holy land, or to suppress the various claimants to
the Shereefate.

The international status of the Shereefate was
never clearly defined. The Caliphs of the newly
arisen Moslem powers "neither expressly recog-
nized nor expressly objected to the Shereefate as

ARABIA 199

unlawful," observes Professor C. Snouck Hur-
gronje ; ''its century-long existence attained more-
over a sort of virtual legitimacy through its ac-
ceptance by many Moslem tribes, who were rep-
resented in the holy city by the annual deputations
of pilgrims. These visitors were constantly ex-
posed to ill-treatment on the part of the Shereef.
Yet, in spite of that, they held to a belief that
domination over the Holy City belonged right-
fully to a branch of the Holy Family. The fact
was simply accepted as irrefutable."

Religiously, the holy land was, of course, sub-
ject to the Caliphate. When two Caliphs appeared
in Islam, the one of Mecca having moved to Da-
mascus and finally to Bagdad, and the so-called
heretical Caliphate established in Egypt, the
Shereef of Mecca had a hard time of it. The two
were soon wiped out by the Mongols and the Sul-
tans took over their spiritual position. Begin-
ning with the thirteenth century the Egyptian Sul-
tans exercised a virtual protectorate over the
Hejaz, their rule lasting until the sixteenth cen-
tury. The conquest of Egypt by the Turks passed
the protectorate over the Shereefate to the Otto-
man Sultans. When the Turks became the most
powerful nation in Islam, their rulers adopted the
title of Caliph. Having conquered practically the
entire Middle East, the Turks allowed the pashas
of their subjugated lands to exercise almost dic-
tatorial rights. The governors of Syria, Mesopo-

200 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

tamia and Egypt all aimed to win the protectorate
over the holy land. This led to deep discon-
tent among the Wahhabis of Central Arabia, zeal-
ous Moslems, who considered that the Turks and
their governors had dishonored Islam by making
the holy cities the bone of contention. They de-
clared a Jihad (holy war) against the Turks,
which was so popular that for a time the Hejaz
was freed from Turkish domination and the Sher-
eefs compelled to recognize the rebels' authority.
It was after tremendous exertions that the Turks,
through the Pasha of Egypt, Mohammed Ali, suc-
ceeded in recapturing the holy land. The Shereef
was then deposed and exiled for countenancing
the Wahhabis and a new Shereef appointed. This
was accomplished in 1813.

iThe Shereefate continued to exist under the
Sultan's suzerainty, and the Egyptian Khedive's
immediate protection. The former tightened his
grip on the Hejaz, trying to convert it into a regu- J
lar province. The Shereefate 's rights were grad-
ually abrogated and there developed a conflict
which did not end until 1880. Even after that
year the exact administrative and sovereign rights
of the Shereef and the Sultan in the holy land
were not clearly fixed. The authority of each de- i
pended on the character of the Turkish governor, \
on the one hand, and the Shereef, on the other. |
Sometimes one attained the mastery, sometimes |
the other. In 1908, with the Turkish Revolution, j

ARABIA 201

both the Turkish governor and the Shereef were
swept out of office, and compelled to go into exile.

For awhile it seemed as if Turkey was to give its
subject nationalities an opportunity to develop
along autonomous lines. The Arabs were among
those who had expected great things from the
Revolution. They had a considerable representa-
tion in the Turkish parliament, where they or-
ganized the Arabian Club, which included those
elements among the Arabs who were imbued with
nationalism. However, the Young Turks turned
their power against cultural autonomy for the
races making up Turkey. They embarked upon
the notorious policy of Ottomanization which
quickly and rudely awakened these races to a real-
ization of their condition. The Armenians, the
Arabs and others resumed their nationalist agi-
tation. The Hejaz became a center of discontent,
which found its opportunity after Turkey's entry
into the w^ar on the side of the Central Powers.

Perhaps the chief cause of the rebellious spirit
in the Hejaz after 1914 was not so much spiritual
as material. The holy land extracted its living
from the annual streams of pilgrims, coming from
Africa, India, Russia, and Turkey itself. The
Great War dried up these sources of revenue,
which was a mighty weapon in the hands of She-
reef Husein, Emir of Mecca, and his AVesternized
sons who had been identified with the Pan- Arabian
national movement. When the Central Powers

202 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

induced the Turkish government to make use of
the Sultan's authority as Caliph, and declare a
holy war against the Allies, they only promoted
the decline of Turkey in Islam. The fact is that
the Sultan 's claim to the Caliphate has never been
fully acknowledged by the Arabs, nor by the Mos-
lems of India and Russia. When the Young Turks
appeared in the saddle in 1908 and initiated a
number of measures tending to modernize social
life in Turkey, they inevitably antagonized the
religious authorities. Especially was this an-
tagonism manifest in the holy land, giving an
added reason to the Shereef to militate against
Constantinople. Young Turkish rule, therefore,
weakened enormously the Sultan's authority as
Caliph over Islam. The Jihad thus fell flat. It
stimulated the Grand Shereef, however, to renew
his never-pressed claim as a descendant of Moham-
med to the Caliphate. With the Turkish armies
engaged on the European and Caucasian battle-
fields, the stage was set for Arabia's revolution.
Under the immediate command of the three sons
of the Shereef, military operations were begun
against Turkey. Mecca was cleared of Ottoman
troops and officials, and Medina besieged. Jeddah,
Arabia's main port on the Red Sea, and Kinfuda,
another port further south, were captured by the
rebels. The roadbed of the Hejaz railway was
destroyed for a distance of a hundred miles, in
order to render it difficult for Turkey to send an

ARABIA 203

army to combat the revolutionists. The Turks
were too busy on other fronts to suppress the
rebels of Hejaz, giving them an opportunity to
consolidate and increase their forces. For once the
surrounding tribes sank their differences and ral-
lied to the banners of the revolution. Even more
remarkable was the response of the remote and
semi-independent Arabian kingdoms to the She-
reef's call. A wave of patriotism united the
Arabs, a thing which had not happened since the
days of Mohammed and his immediate successors.
The Grand Shereef then found his opportunity to
declare Arabia's independence, in a remarkable
document which read partly as follows:

''In the name of Grod, the Merciful, the Compas-
sionate, this is our general proclamation to all
our Moslem brothers. 0 God, judge between us
and our people in truth ; Thou art the Judge.

"The world knoweth that the first of all Mos-
lem princes and rulers to acknowledge the Turk-
ish Government w^ere the Emirs of Mecca the
Blessed. . . . For, in truth, they were one with
the Government until the Committee of Union and
Progress rose up, and strengthened itself, and
laid its hands on power. Consider how since then
ruin has overtaken the State, and its possessions
have been torn from it, and its place in the world
has been lost, and now it has been drawn into this
last and most fatal war.

"All this they have done, being led away by

204 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

shameful appetites, which are not for me to set
forth, but which are public and a cause for sorrow
to the Moslems of the whole world, who have seen
this greatest and most noble Moslem Power broken
in pieces and led down to ruin and utter destruc-
tion. Our lament is also for so many of its sub-
jects, Moslems and others alike, whose lives have
been sacrificed without any fault of their own.
Some have been treacherously put to death, others
cruelly driven from their homes, as though the
calamities of war were not enough. Of these
calamities the heaviest share has fallen upon the
holy land. The poor, and even families of sub-
stance, have been made to sell their doors and
windows, yea, even the wooden frames of their
houses, for bread, after they had lost their furni-
ture and all their goods. Not even so was the lust
of the Union and Progress fulfilled. They laid
bare all the measure of their wicked design, and
broke the only bond that endured between them
and the true followers of Islam. They departed
from their obedience to the precepts of the Book.
"For this it has been clearly our part and our
necessary duty to separate ourselves from them
and renounce them and their obedience. Yet we
would not believe their wickedness, and tried to
think that they were the imaginings of evil-doers
to make a division between us and the Govern-
ment. We bore with them until it was apparent
to all men that the rulers of Turkey were Enver

ARABIA 205

Pasha, Jemal Pasha, and Tallaat Bey, who were
doing whatsoever they pleased. They made their
guilt manifest when they wrote to the Judge of
the Sacred Court in Mecca traducing the verses
in the Surah of the Cow, and laying upon him to
reject the evidence of believers outside the Court
and to consider only the deeds and contracts en-
grossed within the Court. They also showed their
guilt when they hanged in one day twenty-one of
the most honorable and enlightened of the Mos-
lems. ... To destroy so many, even of cattle,
at one time would be hard for men void of all
natural affection or mercy. And if we suppose
they had some excuse for this evil deed, by what
right did they carry away to strange countries the
innocent and most miserable families of those ill-
fated men? Children, old men, and delicate
women bereft of their natural protectors were sub-
jected in exile to all foul usages and even to tor-
tures, as though the woes they had already
suffered were not chastisement enough. . . .

''We leave the judgment of these misdeeds,
which we have touched upon so briefly, to the
world in general and to Moslems in particular.
What stronger proof can we desire of the faith-
lessness of their inmost hearts to the Religion,
and of their feelings towards the Arabs, than their
bombardment of that ancient House, which God
has chosen for His House, saying, 'Keep My
House pure for all who come to it' — a House so

206 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

venerated by all Moslems'? From their fort of
Jyad, when the revolt began, they shelled it. . . .
We leave all this to the Moslem world for judg-
ment.

*' Yes, we can leave the judgment to the Moslem
world ; but we may not leave our religion and our
existence as a nation to be a plaything of the
Unionists. God has made open for us the attain-
ment of freedom and independence and has shown
us a way of victory to cut off the hand of the
oppressors, and to cast out their garrison from
our midst. We have attained independence, an
independence of the rest of the Ottoman Empire,
which is still groaning under the tyranny of our
enemy. Our independence is complete, absolute,
not to be laid hands on by any foreign influence or
aggression, and our aim is the preservation of
Islam and the uplifting of its standard in the
world. We fortify ourselves on the noble religion
which is our only guide and advocate in the prin-
ciples of administration and justice. We are
ready to accept all things in harmony with the
Faith and all that leads to the Mountain of Islam,
and in particular to uplift the mind and the
spirit of all classes of the people in so far as we
have strength and ability."

One of the first acts of the new Arabian king-
dom was to establish diplomatic relations with the
Allied governments. France sent a delegation to
Mecca to congratulate the Grrand Shereef on the

ARABIA 207

liberation of his country, and England and France
recognized his government. A modern council of
ministers was set up and the holy land, for the
first time in centuries, found itself under a decent
administration. Mecca was thoroughly cleaned,
a newspaper was established there, schools were
founded and a modern army organized. Arabian
forces helped Great Britain in its campaign in
Mesopotamia. Even Arabian aviators fought the
Turks. When Baghdad was captured by the
British the Emir of Mecca sent a congratulatory
message to the British High Commissioner in
Egypt, praying that God grant ''victory and suc-
cess to all those who are defending justice, civili-
zation and the liberty of nations."

Shereef Feisul, the third son of Emir Husein of
Mecca, commanded the Arab force which operated
in the rear of the Turks east of the Jordan, and
occupied Damascus before General Allenby
reached it. It is quite possible that without the
Arab army outflanking it, the Ottoman army's
debacle in Syria would not have occurred. Gen-
eral Feisul was sent by his government to Paris
and London, to present his people 's claims to the
Allies and the United States. It is the hope and
aim of the government of the Hejaz to become a
nucleus for a united Arabian state, including
Mesopotamia and Syria. "The Arabs ardently
desire national independence," a correspondent
quoted the Shereef Feisul, and added : ' ' Owing to

208 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

the existence of an Anglo-Frencli agreement, made
long before the importance of the Arabs as a mili-
tary factor was realized, they fear that their
nationalistic longings may not receive that con-
sideration in the peace settlement to which they
think they are entitled. Feisul therefore pins his
hopes on Mr. Wilson. Surely, the Great War
which has revealed so many strange things wit-
nessed nothing else so epoch-making and so un-
expected as the spectacle of a great Arab chief-
tain who traces his lineage directly back to the
Moslem Prophet, waiting in Western Europe for
the President of the United States, who is now
looked upon by the Arab nation as their friend
and protector."

According to the understanding reached early
in 1915 between France and Great Britain, the in-
dependence of the Arabian kingdom of the Hejaz
was recognized by both countries, but Mesopota-
mia was placed under British control and Syria
under French. Arabian nationalism, however,
aims at the creation of a united Arabian state,
wherein it comes in conflict with the interests of
the French government and the aspirations of a
portion of the inhabitants of Syria. The Mos-
lems of Syria are in sympathy with the Pan-
Arabian movement, and are supported by Great
Britain. On the other hand, the majority of the
Christian Syrians, especially in the Lebanon, de-
sire autonomy under a French protectorate.

ARABIA 209

* The relations between the new Arabia and the
Zionists of Palestine are very friendly. While the
Christian Syrians are generally opposed to a
Jewish Palestine, the Arabs of the Hejaz are in
full accord with the Zionist leaders. An entente
was even concluded between Dr. Weitzman, the
head of the Zionist Commission in Palestine, and
Prince Feisul, representing the Arab government,
in June, 1918. Even more cordial relations
were established between the Arabs and Arme-
nians. The former, operating east of the Jordan,
rescued a number of Armenian refugees, men,
women, and children, deported by the Turks to
the Syrian desert. Boghos Nubar Pasha, head of
the Armenian Delegation, sent the following mes-
sage to Shereef Feisul:

**To the noble born Emir Feisul, — We have just
learned of the rescue of our unfortunate fellow-
countrymen through the efforts of your gallant
troops in Southern Syria. May God bless and
prosper the progress of your arms. The chival-
rous act of the noble Moslems who fight under
your banners adds fresh luster to the annals of
the Arab race. Every Armenian throughout the
world is to-day an ally of the Arab movement;
the praises of your clemency and the justice of
your cause shall be known wherever we can make
our voices heard."

The Lord Mayor of London and the English
Friends of Armenia also sent congratulatory mes-

210 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

sages to Emir Feisul. A reply was received from
the King of the Hejaz which, coming from the
chief religious authority in Mecca, throws a new
light on Mohammedanism as practiced in the new
Arabia. It read:

''Your kind message to Feisul, of which I have
heard, is a proof of good will and affection. We
pray God to make us worthy of your kind thoughts.
Feisul, in assisting the oppressed, has only per-
formed one of the first duties of our religion and
of the Arabs' faith. I say with confidence and
pride that the Armenian race and other races in
similar plight are regarded by us as partners in
our fortunes in weal and woe. We ask God be-
fore everything to give us strength to enable us
to do them helpful service by which to prove to
the world the true feelings of Islam, whose watch-
word is freedom. May God preserve you in health
and bring your desires to a successful attainment
by His help and favor. ' '

II

PALESTINE

The Jews are unique among the resurrected
nationalities of the world. They are the only
race not in physical possession of its motherland
to rise to nationhood. Scattered all over the
earth, inhabiting every country of the Old and
New World, the Jews have retained their racial
characteristics in all foreign environments. Since
the day they went into exile, more than eighteen
centuries ago, they never ceased to pray for their
return to the Land of Israel. Although regarded
by the nations among whom they lived as a relig-
ious sect, the Jews, in fact, were always a people
with distinct national aspirations. It is only in
recent years that portions of the Jewish race in
the West began to abandon their nationalism and
keep their identity as a religious group only. But
of the twelve million Jews in the world, there are
hardly more than a million who have completely
assimilated themselves with their adopted coun-
tries. The rest may not aU be ardent nationalists
anxious to return to Palestine, but they are all

211

212 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Jewish nationals by nature, being exiles in spirit
and strangers wherever they live or go.

The preservation of the Jew in exile will always
remain one of the marvels of history. The last
Jewish state disappeared in A. D. 70, when the
Roman general Titus captured Jerusalem, but
the end of Jewish political hopes did not come till
sixty-five years later. In 132 the Jews of Pales-
tine rebelled against Rome under the leadership
of Bar Cochba, who was declared to be the Mes-
siah by the leading rabbi of the time. The rebel-
lion was at first successful, Jerusalem was freed,
the Temple partly restored, and many of the
Jews who had left the Holy Land rallied around
the banner of Bar Cochba. However, his rule did
not last more than three and a half years. A
powerful Roman army finally defeated the rebels
in 135, after desperate resistance, in which six
hundred thousand Jews perished in battle.

The Dispersion reaUy began with the destruc-
tion of this last Jewish political government, al-
though large colonies of Jews were already scat-
tered throughout the Roman Empire. Jerusalem
became a forbidden city, where no Jew was al-
lowed. The remnant of the Palestinian Jewry
erected several centers of learning north of the
capital. The task of these rabbinical schools was
to evolve a set of laws interpreting the Old Testa-
ment which would keep the Jews from losing their
faith and national aspirations in Dispersion. A

PALESTINE 213

similar seat of learning came into existence in
Babjdonia, then a Persian dominion. A large
Jewish colony there for a time attained self-gov-
ernment under the leadership of the exilarch, who
claimed descent from the house of David. The
Babylonian Jews, like those of Palestine, devoted
themselves to the study of jurisprudence. The re-
sult was two sets of the Law, or Talmud, one called
the Jerusalem and the other the Babylonian
edition.

While the religious-national force created by the
rabbis undoubtedly was a great factor in preserv-
ing the Jews in Dispersion, especially in the first
centuries of our era, an economic torce soon de-
veloped which contributed greatly to the same ef-
fect. Tom from their soil, persecuted and driven
from place to place, the Jews were compelled to
turn to trading as a means for daily existence.
Thus developed the Jewish aptitude for business.
It was encouraged by the conditions which the
Christian communities among whom the Jews
lived imposed upon them. The segregation of the
Jews, the creation of certain quarters in the
ancient cities for this wandering race, naturally
promoted their seclusion and their cohesion, as
well as their devotion to traditions and prejudices
which in other circumstances would have gradu-
ally vanished.

The Jews spread westward, to Byzantium,
Eome, France, Spain. The rise of Mohammedan-

214 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ism and the Arabian tide gave strong impetus to
the Jewish Dispersion, although the Jews fared
much better under the Arabs than among the
Christians. The Arabs overran, and settled in,
the surrounding countries. Palestine, Syria,
Mesopotamia, Egypt, Morocco, Spain became
Arab dominions. The Jews in Mesopotamia con-
tributed greatly to the magnificent civilization
which arose in Baghdad, under the caliphate, in
the Middle Ages. In science and in trade they
were among the leaders, and their brethren in
Spain achieved even greater success. "The dis-
tinctive feature of the Spanish- Jewish culture,"
writes Israel Abrahams, "was its comprehensive-
ness. Literature and affairs, science and state-
craft, poetry and medicine, these various expres-
sions of human nature and activity were so har-
moniously balanced that they might be found in
the possession of one and the same individual.
The Jews of Spain attained to high places in the
service of the state from the time of the Moorish
conquest, in 711. . . . So, too, the greatest Jew
of the Middle Ages, Maimonides, was a Spaniard.
In him culminates the Jewish expression of the
Spanish-Moorish culture; his writings had an
influence on European scholasticism and contrib-
uted significant elements to the philosophy oft
Spinoza." (Encyclopaedia Britannica.)

Christian persecution of the Jews assumed am
organized form during the Crusades. In France, ,

PALESTINE 215

Germany and England colonies of Jews had been
established early and were the sole agents of trade
between the East and the West. The Crusades
not only resulted in hundreds of eJewish massa-
cres, due to the religious frenzy of the Christians,
but also brought with them economic ruin to the
Jews. A class of traders sprang up among the
Christians which soon found itself in competition
with the Jewish settlers. This economic cause was
one of the leading forces responsible for the suffer-
ing of the Jews in Dispersion in the past thousand
years. The Jew came to a country and was en-
couraged by its rulers to engage in trade. After
playing the role of the commercial pioneer, he
found himself sooner or later surrounded by na-
tives who had learned to compete with him. Then
the Christian traders would resort to all means to
bring about the persecution or expulsion of the
Jew from their midst.

Not infrequently the Jews would be expelled
from a country and soon afterward invited again
by its rulers. The latter were always in need of
money. The Church, by prohibiting Christians to
engage in money-lending and restricting the occu-
pations open to the Jews, forced the Jews to turn
to usury. In some countries this was the only
trade they were allowed to engage in, so that the
reigning houses utilized the Jews for the purpose
of extracting from their subjects the funds neces-
sary to sustain their courts. The money that the

216 THE EESURHECTED NATIONS

Jew accumulated by usury went to the royal fam-
ily, but tlie stigma of usurer and the hatred of
the populace were fastened upon him.

Where the Jew was given a free opportunity to
live, he soon proved a builder of commercial
empires. Baghdad reached its powerful position
in civilization under the rule of the tolerant
caliphs, when the Jews enjoyed full liberty of
conscience and action. Portugal and Spain be-
came great civilized empires when the center of
Jewish life shifted there. The Inquisition, which
resulted in the expulsion of hundreds of thou-
sands of Jews and the death of tens of thousands
more, was the greatest blow to Spain and Portugal
themselves. The Jewish rabbis anathematized the
two countries, and to this day no orthodox Jew
will step on their soil. With the departure of the
Jews, many of whom had been forcibly baptized,
the decline of Portugal and Spain set in, so that
to-day these two countries are the most impover-
ished in Europe. All the recent efforts of the
Spanish government to cause an influx of Jews
into Spain proved futile, so deep-seated is the
Jewish memory of the Inquisition.

From Portugal and Spain the Jew went in
large numbers to Holland, France, Italy, Germany,
Austria, Poland, Turkey. With the arrival of the
Jews, welcomed by the Dutch government, the
Netherlands rapidly rose to the first maritime
power in the world, superseding Portugal and

PALESTINE 217

Spain. England, after having expelled the Jews
in the fifteenth century, now adopted a friendly
attitude, and in 1655 Cromwell reached an agree-
ment with the leading rabbi of Amsterdam, Man-
asseh ben Israel, whereby the Jews were permitted
to return to Great Britain. The Spanish and Por-
tuguese Jews who settled in England contributed
no small share to the building of the British Em-
pire. Meanwhile the Jews in the East were suffer-
ing persecution. They were herded in ghettos and
restricted in the commonest rights. Their only
means of existence in such countries as Poland
and Germany, for instance, was to buy the favor
of the various ruling princes and magnates. Hated
by the people, despised by their royal and feudal
protectors, the Jew had to rely on his wits and
developed certain traits of character which have,
not entirely disappeared yet in those countries,
such as Rumania, Poland, Russia, where he is
still smarting under religious, political or eco-
nomic disabilities.

The emancipation of the Jew really began to-
ward the end of the eighteenth century, although
in such countries as England, Holland, Italy and
especially Turkey the Jew had previously enjoyed
much freedom. The American Revolution gave
considerable impetus to the movement. A Jew,
Robert Morris, played a leading role in the found-
ing of this Republic, as financier of the War of
Independence. It was due to loans secured by

218 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

him from the French and to money advanced by
himself and borrowed on his credit that Wash-
ington was enabled to transfer his army from
Dobbs Ferry to Yorktown in 1781. In the same
year, in distant Austria, Emperor Joseph removed
many of the disabilities binding the Jews, allow-
ing them to learn handicrafts, to study arts and
sciences, and to some extent even to engage in
agriculture.

Then came the French Revolution. In 1807
Napoleon summoned a Jewish Assembly in Paris.
The revolutionary movement throughout Europe
in 1848 resulted in the complete emancipation of
the Italian, Austrian and Scandinavian Jews.
Only in Russia, where the bulk of the Jews found
themselves after the amiexation of the greater
part of Poland by the Tsars, and in Rumania,
were the Jews deprived of elementary rights and
allowed to live only in certain limited areas. Dur-
ing the reign of Nicholas I, the ' ' Iron Tsar, ' ' cruel
attempts were made to Russify the Jews by force.
Their children were abducted and entrusted to
special organizations to be raised as Christians.
There was a breathing space for the Russian Jews
during the rule of Alexander II, the liberator of
the serfs in 1861. In 1878, by the Treaty of Ber-
lin, the Rumanian Jews were emancipated. But
this was never more than a paper emancipation.
In 1881, with the accession to the Russian throne
of Alexander III, one of the blackest periods of

PALESTINE 219

Jewish history was begun. The era of pogroms,
expulsions and restrictive laws began. It soon
produced several very important effects. First, a
stream of emigrants commenced to flow from the
East to the United States, Canada, South America,
England, South Africa. It grew in volume as the
persecutions and the pogroms multiplied, so that
toward the end of the first decade of the present
century the volume of Jewish emigration from
Russia, Poland and Rumania reached an annual
figure of a quarter of a million. Second, the Rus-
sian-Polish Jews identified themselves with the
various revolutionary movements, playing leading
parts in all of them. Third, the modern Zionist
movement, aiming at the restoration of the Jewish
nation in Palestine, was bom.

In the course of centuries of wandering the Jew
never stopped hoping for the appearance of the
Messiah, who would lead all the scattered sons of
Israel back to the Holy Land. At various times,
in response to the innermost Jewish aspirations,
false Messiahs appeared, quickly gathering about
them large followings. Thus in the 8th, 12th and
16th centuries the Jews were misled by impostors,
and in the 17th century the whole Jewish world
was profoundly shaken by the rise of one Sabbatai
Zevi, who declared that he was the long-awaited
Messiah. But the movement born in Russia in
1882 was a modern effort essentially. Groups of
Jewish students and enthusiastic nationalists

220 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

raised the banner of a Jewish homeland in Pales-
tine and went there to till the soil and found colo-
nies. These pioneers revived the ancient Hebrew
and proclaimed it as the tongue of the coming
Jewish state. The difficulties they encountered
were many. But, supported by organizations of
"Lovers of Zion," formed in Russia, they grad-
ually made progress.

Meanwhile in Western Europe, where the Jew
by virtue of his enjoyment of equal rights pene-
trated into every branch of trade and industiy and
climbed to the very top of the financial, political
and learned world, the anti-Semitic movement was
born. It started in Germany and reverberated
powerfully in France. The ancient ritual murder
accusation, which originated in the early days of
Christianity, when it was leveled against the
Christians, was revived, and made much use of in
Austria, Rumania and Russia. This gave rise to
national sentiments among the Western Jews. In
1896 there appeared a pamphlet, called ' ' The Jew-
ish State," in German, English and French. Its
author was a Vienna journalist, Theodore Herzl.
It made a great sensation, and was rapidly trans-
lated into many other languages. Dr. Herzl, a
fiery personality, advocated the departure of the
Jews from Europe and their formation in Pales-
tine, under Turkish suzerainty, of a republic. The
response to Dr. Herzl 's project was universal and
instantaneous. In 1897 there met in Basel,

PALESTINE 221

Switzerland, the first Jewish congress, represent-
ing Jews from all over the world, of all classes
and beliefs. It laid the foundations of political
Zionism, adopting as its official aim the *^ estab-
lishing for the Jewish people a publicly and legally
assured home in Palestine. ' '

The Zionist movement made great headway
among the Russian, Polish and Rumanian Jews.
Dr. Herzl had audiences with Sultan Abdul
Hamid, the Pope, British and Russian ministers,
but failed to secure a ' ' charter ' ' of Jewish auton-
omy in Palestine from Turkey. The British gov-
ernment offered to him a section of East Africa
for Jewish colonization. Dr. Herzl favored the
acceptance of the proposal, but the Eastern Zion-
ists, who were in the majority, rejected it. In
1904 Dr. Herzl died, and for some years the Zionist
movement was in confusion. Meanwhile Jewish
colonies were being founded in Palestine and the
Hebrew language, mainly through the efforts of
Ben Yehuda, a philologist who devoted his life to
the task, became the spoken tongue of thousands
of Jews everywhere. Newspapers and magazines
were published in Hebrew, and modern poets and
novelists and dramatists infused a new spirit into
the tongue of the Prophets.

At the outbreak of the Great War there were
more than twelve million Jews in the world. In
Russia alone, including Russian Poland, there
were six million Jews. In the United States there

222 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

were three million. In Austria-Hungary and Ger-
many there were another two million. The rest
were scattered all over the earth. In the recon-
structed Europe the majority of the Jews will be
found in Poland, less than four million. The
Jewish problem in Russia is thus transferred to
Poland, where the relations between the Jews and
the Poles are unfortunately strained.

The war caused untold suffering to the Jew.
Three-quarters of a million of Jewish soldiers
were impressed into the Tsar's armies. Hundreds
of thousands of Jewish homes were wiped out and
millions of old men, women and children set wan-
dering. While the Russian, German and Austro-
Hungarian revolutions brought at first new free-
dom to the Jews, the class-struggle which broke
out in those countries proved ruinous to the
middle classes, where the majority of the Jews
belong. All this stimulated Jewish nationalism.
The collapse of Turkey gave even a more violent
impetus to Zionism. Early in the war a Jewish
volunteer unit cooperated with the British in the
Gallipoli campaign. Later a Jewish Legion was
recruited in the United States and Great Britain,
and participated in General AUenby's Palestinian
campaign. On November 2, 1917, Arthur J. Bal-
four, British Secretary of State for Foreign Af-
fairs, addressed a note to Lord Rothschild in which
he made the following declaration on behalf of the
British government:

PALESTINE 223

''His Majesty's govermnent view with favor
the establishment in Palestine of a national home
for the Jewish people, and will use their best en-
deavors to facilitate the achievement of this object,
it being clearly understood that nothing shall be
done which may prejudice the civil and religious
rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Pal-
estine, or the rights and political status enjoyed
by Jews in any other country."

Similar assurances were made by the govern-
ments of France, Italy, Greece, Serbia, Holland,
Siam, and finally by President Wilson, although
the United States was not at war with Turkey.
Then followed a remarkable demonstration of
unanimity on the part of all Jews in favor of a
home for the Jewish people in Palestine. Those
Jews who had completely identified themselves
with their adopted countries, as well as those in-
tellectual and laboring elements who believed only
in proletarian internationalism, recognized that
half of the Jews in Europe were in such an
economic, political and cultural state as to welcome
a return to Palestine and the establishment there
of a Jewish national home. The overwhelming
majority of the Zionists, however, feel that such
a state cannot be evolved in a short period, and
favor British protection and guidance. One of
the greatest diflSculties ahead of the Zionists is
to be found in the Arab population of the Holy
Land. These Arabs have no national conscious-

224 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ness, but their rights cannot be ignored. The
Zionists have therefore concluded an entente with
the King of the Hejaz, the new Arabian state.
However, the Syrians will not recognize the Jew-
ish claims to Palestine. The situation is compli-
cated by the fact that the Syrian claim to hege-
mony over the Palestinian Arabs is denied by the
Arabian kingdom of the Hejaz.

Nahum Sokolov, one of the Zionist leaders,
thus defined the territorial aspirations of Zion-
ism: "We ask not for the greater Palestine of
Solomon, but simply for the tract of country be-
tween our ancient boundaries and Beersheba, or,
in modern terms, from the River Kishon to El
Arish. Westward our limit will be the sea. East-
ward it may well be that the new Arabian king-
dom will preclude our extension beyond the River
Jordan, which would thus form our eastern boun-
dary. ' '

Ill

SYRIA

Syria in Arabic means the ' * Regent of the Sun. ' '
In the European languages Syria is employed to
designate several things. Thus, the geographical
definition of Syria comprehends a strip of terri-
toiy, a hundred and fifty miles wide, on the eastern
coast of the Mediterranean Sea, the northern
boundary of which is the Taurus range, the south-
ern limits — the Sinai Peninsula, and the eastern
border — Mesopotamia and the Syrian Desert.
This territory includes Palestine and the Lebanon.
But Syria politically is a very loose term. The
Syrian nationalists seek to define it along geo-
graphical lines. Premier Lloyd George divided it
into two separate domains when he announced on
January 5, 1918, that ''Arabia, Armenia, Meso-
potamia, Syria and Palestine are in our judgment
entitled to a recognition of their separate national
conditions. ' ' Foreign Minister Pichon, of France,
divided it into three political realms when he de-
clared on December 29, 1918, that ' ' our rights are
incontestable in Armenia, Syria, Lebanon, and

227

228 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Palestine." The term Syria employed in these
pages excludes Palestine.

The difficulty of determining Syria's political
boundaries is primarily due to the fact that Syria's
population is not an ethnic unit. The two and a
half milhon inhabitants of Syria are extremely
heterogeneous. What we call Syrians are, ethni-
cally speaking, Arabs, Turks, Kurds, Greeks,
Druses, Hebrews, Assyrians, Circassians, and
people combining the blood of these various ele-
ments. The larger part of the Syrian population
is Arabian in origin and Mohammedan in religion.
The Syrian Arabs are the most enlightened rep-
resentatives of their race, and among the most
advanced Moslems in the world.

The number of religions in Syria is almost as
diversified as that of its races. The Moslems are
in the majority, but the Christians are a strong
minority. The Greek Orthodox and Roman
Catholic Churches have large f ollowings, with the
latter predominating. There are some non-Chris-
tian and non-Moslem sects in Syria, of whom the
most notable is that of the Druses. Among the
Catholics the most powerful and progressive ele-
ment is that of the Maronites, of Assyrian origin,
who form the vanguard of Syrian nationalism.

The first great power to rise in Syria was Phoe-
nicia, which nearly five thousand years ago built
the cities of Tyre and Sidon and grew so rich that
the Egyptians invaded it repeatedly for plunder.

SYEIA 229

The Phoenicians were great navigators and car-
ried on extensive commerce with the West, found-
ing many colonies. South of Phoenicia the Philis-
tines, from whom the name Palestine is derived,
established themselves, and were followed by the
Hebrews, who maintained friendly relations with
Phoenicia. Syria was in turn invaded and con-
quered by the Assyrians and Babylonians and
Persians. Alexander the Great invaded it next
and many Greeks settled in the country, giving
birth to a strong civilization, centering around
Antioch. Then Syria was conquered by Tigranes,
King of Armenia, and with his fall came Roman
rule and subsequently that of Byzantium. Chris-
tianity, originating in Palestine, spread early to
all Syria. But the rise of Islam in the seventh
century nearly wiped it all out. The Arabs in-
vaded and conquered the country, settling there in
large numbers. "When the title of the caliphate
was assumed by the Ottoman rulers, Syria passed
into the possession of Turkey. But the country
retained its Arabian civilization, so that Arabic
is the spoken and written tongue of most Syrians.
During the Crusades the Christians in Syria came
in touch with the Roman Church. The Maronites,
who number about half a million and live largely
in the Lebanon, resisted at first Rome's efforts to
dominate them. At the beginning of the eighteenth
century Louis XIV established French influence
over the Maronites. In 1736 the Pope Clement

230 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

XII recognized the Maronite Church, which has
since remained an individual institution. In 1860,
as a result of feuds between the Maronites and
Druses, France was instrumental in obtaining
autonomy for the Lebanon, to be exercised in
agreement with the wishes of the western powers.
Although the separation of the Church from the
State in France led to a weakening of the French
influence in Syria, new forces appeared to take
the place of the official Catholic missionaries, —
economic forces as well as cultural and political.
The Syrians educated in French schools had pro-
duced a number of gifted leaders who began to
preach the doctrine of Syrian nationalism. They
were naturally Francophile and France encour-
aged their activity. At the same time France ini-
tiated a policy of economic penetration into Syria.
She constructed there hundreds of miles of rail-
road. The number of French schools in the
country was equal to that of all the other nations
combined. At the outbreak of the war hundreds
of Syrians volunteered their services to France.
The progressive elements in Syria are mainly
recruited from the students of the Greek Ortho-
dox, Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, and
Presbyterian schools. But the Moslems in Syria
have also made considerable progress. A na-
tional consciousness has manifested itself among
all Syrians, regardless of faith. Thousands of
Moslems, for instance, who had emigrated to

SYRIA 231

America to accumulate some money, returned
later to their native villages and cities. These
would invariably bring with them a higher state
of civilization and a realization of international
conditions, contributing greatly to the spread of
Syrian nationalism at home. While the Syrian
Christians produced several brilliant nationalist
leaders the Moslems did not lag much. One of
them. Sheikh Abdul-Hamid Zehrawi, played an
important role in the Syrian nationalist movement.
He was executed by the Turks in 1915 in Damas-
cus, together with nineteen other prominent Syr-
ians including officers, magistrates and journal-
ists, for instigating an insurrection against the
Ottoman government.

The Turkish misrule in Syria forced hundreds
of thousands of Syrians to leave their country.
About three hundred thousand of them came to
the United States and Mexico. Nearly half a mil-
lion are said to have settled in South America,
especially in Brazil. They support a large num-
ber of native publications, as well as numerous
churches. Young Syria, at home and abroad, pro-
duced a large number of literary persons, and
Syrian poetry has achieved both great beauty
and depth.

Syria was martyred by the Turks in the course
of the Great War. Court martials established at
Aleppo, Damascus and Beyrout sentenced to death
thousands and to terms of imprisonment tens of

232 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

thousands. As in the case of the other oppressed
nationalities, these persecutions only solidified
national feeling among the Syrians. A central
committee was created in Paris, aiming at the
complete severance of Syria from the Ottoman
Empire and her erection into a distinct national
entity under French protection. However, while i
the Syrians are all agreed as to the idea of sep-
arate national existence, while they are almost
unanimous in the belief that their country is not
yet in a condition to function as an independent
state, they are by no means agreed as to the power
under whose aegis Syria should be placed. Per-
haps the majority of the active Syrian nationalists
are for a French protectorate. However, there are
those who would like to see Great Britain assume
control of Syria. Another faction, largely hail-
ing from the United States, is clamoring for an
American protectorate. In a speech delivered to
the Central Syrian Committee in Paris, several
months before the British occupation of Syria and
the collapse of Turkey, Sir Mark Sykes, the noted
authority on the Near East, said :

"Now suppose that the Turks are ejected from
Syria, suppose that the Allies have saved Syria,
but that the people are not united (I mean the
intellectual leaders of the people), what mil hap-
pen then? If you are not united some sort of
a Government will have to be imposed upon you,
and a Government which is imposed has neither

SYEIA 233

the strength nor the stability of a Government
which is desired by the people. I see Syria start-
ing on a life with a Government which is not
congenial, with agitation and discontent at the
root of everything. It is therefore of the great-
est importance that there should be a firm will
and a policy for unity among Syrians. You are
dispersed among the nations, many of you live
in Paris, others at Marseilles, yet others in Lon-
don and others in Manchester. Many of you have
made your homes in the towns of America, and
there is a large Syrian colony in Egypt. Unite
yourselves and you will become a powerful politi-
cal force, and if you want a program I will dic-
tate one to you. In the first place, you must do
away with the negative policy of the Turks ; that
which is intolerable in Armenia is equally intoler-
able in Syria. In the second place, you must
look to France for her indispensable aid, that aid
which a people which has for so long been op-
pressed needs before it is capable of standing
alone. You must also demand the guarantees
of the powerful countries of the world, so that
you may not again be subjected to the tyranny of
the Turks, which has reduced you to poverty and
to discord. I imagine that all the religions and
all the races of Syria can unite on such a pro-
gram. As to you Syrians who have your full lib-
erty, I assure you that you have an enormous
responsibility with regard to those of your com-

234 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

patriots, Moslems, Christians, or Druses, who are
still in Syria, for these latter are unable to ex-
press themselves or to organize."

However, the ending of the Great War still
found the Syrians divided. The successful British
campaign in Syria, in cooperation with the forces
of the Arabian kingdom of the Hejaz, introduced
some new factors into the problem. The Syrian
Mohammedans always preferred the British to
the French. With the Arabs of Mecca advanc-
ing with the British into Syria, British influence
rose even higher. The son of the E^ng of the
Hejaz, Shereef Feisul, came to Europe, after help-
ing to rout the Turks from Syria, to press for
the union of Syria with the Arabian kingdom of
the Hejaz. It was even reported that Great Brit-
ain favored such a solution of the Syrian prob-
lem, as it would place Arabia, Palestine, Syria,
Mesopotamia — the entire Arabian population of
Turkey — under its influence. However, France
proclaimed her ''incontestable rights" in Syria
and the Lebanon.

In January, 1919, the Syrians held a congress
in Paris, and were addressed by M. Franklin-
Bouillon, vice-president of the Foreig-n Affairs
Committee of the French Chamber of Deputies.
He appealed for unanimous support in ''defence
of Syrian interests and the maintenance of French
prestige in the Orient, where France for centuries
has not ceased to work for the emancipation of

SYRIA 235

humanity." A strong pro-British current, how-
ever, developed among the Syrians. A leader of
this current stated his views as follows in the sec-
ond year of the war, before the Arabian revolu-
tion and the establishment of a national state in
the Hejaz occurred, to Vladimir Jabotinsky, as
quoted in his '* Turkey and the War" :

''Before the war broke out it had always been
an axiom with us that England did not want Syria.
So the only alternative to Turkish rule, for those
who did not believe in independence, was France.
The Turkish menace to Egypt changed the whole
situation. My friends from Cairo write me that
now on all sides the conviction is growing that
England will not be able to remain indifferent to
the future of Syria. They think England will
claim for herself the southern part of the Syrian
coast, if not the whole of it. If it is true, then
we Arabs have to reconsider our attitude. If we
really have a choice between France and Eng-
land, many of us would prefer England. We do
not feel any particular love for either; as a mat-
ter of feeling, our instinctive sympathy goes
rather to the French than to the English. But
the French rule is centralistic and tends to im-
pose on the native population the French language
and customs. England is incomparably more
liberal. We have two examples before our eyes:
Tunis and Egypt were occupied at the same time.
Tunis has been completely 'Frenchified' in every-

236 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

thing — administration, tribunals, schools, even re-
ligious education; whilst in Egypt our national
language plays a prominent role in schools and
public life. This difference is eloquent enough.
Besides, there is another consideration of no less
importance. The population of the southern and
eastern Mediterranean coasts who all speak Arab
dialects and could form in the future a great
united nation, have been cut up into sections un-
der different rule: Morocco, Algeria and Tunis
are French, Tripoli is Italian, Egypt is British,
and now they are speaking of Syria about to be-
come French. I think it is trop de morcellement.
Many of us will certainly prefer Egypt and Syria
to be one, under the same rule, and so consti-
tute a powerful nucleus of Arab nationhood."

The roads open before Syria are many. Some
of them lead to autonomy under French, British,
or even American protection. One proposal,
emanating from Syrians in the United States, is
to place Syria under the joint suzerainty of these
three powers. Another proposal, sponsored by
the Shereef of Mecca and many Pan- Arabian na-
tionalists, is to unite Syria with the Hejaz. Still
another plan would divide Syria into two parts,
the Lebanon and Syria proper, putting the former
under French and the latter under British guid-
ance. Finally, there is the proposal to have a
league of nations take charge of Syria and all
similar countries. The Syrians all over the world

SYRIA 237

are agreed, however, on the need for ''the com-
plete and permanent elimination of Turkish rule
from Syria" and the introduction of self-govern-
ment there imder some friendly guardianship.

IV

MESOPOTAMIA

Mesopotamia occupies a central position in the
Middle East. As a geographical term it embraces
the territory through which the Tigris and Eu-
phrates flow. As a political term it is somewhat
narrower. It is bounded on the north by Kurdis-
tan and Assyria, on the west by Syria, on the
east by Persia, and on the south by the desert.

It was in Mesopotamia that the great empires of
Assyria and Babylon were founded. Persia,
Greece and Parthia conquered it, ruling over it in
turn till the rise of Rome. In the third century
the Roman armies invaded Mesopotamia and for
three centuries afterwards struggled with Persia
for control over the land. Every wave of invad-
ers left its traces in the blood of the population.
Already in the first centuries of the present era
large Arab colonies were established in Mesopo-
tamia. Christianity spread early among the As-
syrians, Arabs, and Jews, but it was of a kind
which did not harmonize with the Roman Church,
so that a split followed between these and the
western Christians.

238

MESOPOTAMIA 239

Mesopotamia was in a state of ruin as a result
of bitter strife when in the seventh century the
Moslem Arabs overran it, spreading the new faith
of Islam. Since then Mesopotamia has been Arab-
ized to such an extent that the history of the coun-
try in the years preceding the Arabian invasion
still remains very obscure. In 762 the city of
Baghdad was founded by the caliph Mansur on
the west bank of the Tigris. It was built in a
circle and became known as the round city. It
grew so rapidly that in less than a century it con-
tained a population of two million, becoming the
greatest city in the world. The Arabian Caliphate
of Baghdad became the leading civilized center
not only in Islam, but in all Asia and Europe.

Arts and science, commerce and trade attained
nnpreceJented heights under the early Baghdad
caliphs, and to the present day that Arabian civi-
lization constitutes one of the marvels of history.
What put an end to it was the arrival of the Turk.
At first the Mongol invaders only destroyed the
political power of the caliphate. As the religious
capital in Islam Baghdad still continued till the
thirteenth century to play an important part in
the East. But then came the Tartars, and with
them the end of the caliphate in Mesopotamia.

Beginning with the sixteenth century Persia
and Turkey struggled for control of Mesopota-
mia. Baghdad changed hands several times, till
it fell into the hands of Sultan Murat IV, in 1638,

240 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

and central Mesopotamia thus came definitely
under the domination of the Ottoman government.
However, a century later it was turned by one of
the Turkish governors into an autonomous king-
dom. Persia then made an unsuccessful effort to
recapture Baghdad.

Central and Lower Mesopotamia were occupied
by the British-Indian forces during the Great War.
When the British entered Baghdad, they an-
nounced that they would grant self-government to
the population. The Mesopotamian Arabs, while
strong bonds unite them with their brethren in
Syria and the Hejaz, have not developed any con-
siderable national movement as yet. However,
many Arab chiefs in Mesopotamia soon allied
themselves with the British against the Turks.

Undoubtedly the greatest British accomplish-
ment in Mesopotamia during the war was that of
the Irrigation Department. From Basra to
Baghdad the British carried out an extensive irri-
gation scheme which redeemed hundreds of thou-
sands of acres of land and won for them the last-
ing friendship of the natives. The Political De-
partment of the British Expeditionary Force was
just as active. Speaking of its achievements in
July, 1918, in the House of Commons, Lord Robert
Cecil said:

''Very satisfactory progress is being made in
redeeming the country from the state of ruin into
which it had fallen under the Turks. Thirteen

MESOPOTAMIA 24^

Government primary schools, four municipal
State-aided schools, a teachers' training school,
and a survey school have been opened; extension
classes in agriculture have also been started. The
local demand for education is very insistent, and
is being met as rapidly as the supply of teachers
will permit. Large tracts of land hitherto untilled
have been brought under the plow through the
combined efforts of the people and the Political
Administration ; use has been made of mechanical
tractors and artillery horses, which have supple-
mented the ordinary means of cultivation. The
opening up of the country by road, rail, and im-
proved water transport, and the establishment
of security on the highways, have resulted in an
increase of trade and a lowering of prices of com-
modities. The contrast between the improved con-
dition of Mesopotamia and that of the neighbor-
ing country occupied by the Turks, where disorder
and famine are chronic, has not failed to impress
the population and its leaders, the local notables,
and tribal chiefs. The relations between our
troops and the people are excellent, and a spirit
of harmony and co-operation prevails. The opin-
ion is frequently expressed that the British peo-
ple mean well by the Arab race. Turning to the
operations of the forces of our Ally, the King of
the Hejaz, the casualties inflicted on the Turks by
the Arab armies along the line between Dera'a and
Ma 'an amount to about 2,000, in addition to which

242 THE RESURR'ECTED NATIONS

two locomotives have been destroyed, 122 culverts
and bridges demolished, and railway communica-
tion between those two points permanently inter-
rupted. In the interior, five Turkish convoys, ag-
gregating 1,500 camels, have been captured by the
Shereef Ali, and a severe defeat has been inflicted
on the Emir of Hail by the Shereef Abdulla. ' '

In the subsequent operations of Arabian forces
in Palestine and Syria, in conjunction with the
movement of General Allenby, Mesopotamian
Arabs participated. This linked them more
closely with the Arabs of the Hejaz, whose aspira-
tion is a union of all their nationals under the
aegis of the Shereef of Mecca. However, the Brit-
ish program, as announced by Lloyd George in
January, 1918, called for a separate Arabian gov-
ernment, under British protection, in Mesopota-
mia.

*'The Arabs," according to a British writer,
' ' though torn by tribal dissensions, have a strong
feeling of kinship and are united by their oconomic
interests. Nomad chiefs who own land in the
Tigris and Euphrates valleys are naturally pre-
disposed to a British occupation which makes their
property more secure, and therefore more val-
uable. One nomad who feels that he has gained
by our advent is likely to impress the fact on the
others, and we may be sure that all Arabia has
by now a shrewd idea of the superiority of British
control over the misrule of the Turk. These con-

MESOPOTAMIA 243

siderations are greatly strengthened by the in-
nate antagonism between Turk and Arab, and by
the Hejaz revolt, which has shown that the Turk,
although a Moslem, can be lawfully fought by
other Moslems. It will be seen, then, that the
British armies in Palestine and Mesopotamia
have already exerted a marked influence over the
whole of that vast region which separates their
fields of action, and that there is nothing fantas-
tic in the program of freeing the Arabs which
General Maude announced in Baghdad."

Four solutions of the Mesopotamian problem
have been suggested. The first is contained in
the understanding between England and France,
whereby the former was to set up an autonomous
native administration in Mesopotamia under Brit-
ish protection. The second is to be found in the
effort of the kingdom of the Hejaz to incorporate
Mesopotamia with Western Arabia under the
Shereef of Mecca. The third is the claim of some
Syrians that Mesopotamia and Syria be united,
in view of their geographical and economic inter-
dependence. The fourth is the proposal to estab-
lish a native government in Mesopotamia under
the immediate guidance and protection of a league
of nations. If there ever was any sentiment in
Mesopotamia for re-union with Turkey, it van-
ished with the surrender of the Ottoman govern-
ment to the Allies. There are no physical or
spiritual ties between the Turks and Arabs.

244 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Syria and Armenia divide Turkey from Mesopota-
mia. The Arabs realized that their stagnation in
the past several centuries was due to Turkish rule
and saw in the removal of this rule the beginning
of a new epoch in their history.

ASSYRIA

The Assyrians are the descendants of the
ancient race which thousands of years ago built
the mighty empires of Assyria and Babylon on
the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates. Only a
handful of the Assyrians remain. They inhabit
the Zorgas highlands, where the Great Zab, a
tributary of the Tigris, has its source, as well as
the cities of Urumia and Mosul. The present
homeland of the Assyrians may be defined as the
triangle between Urumia (on the lake of the same
name), Mosul, and the southern extremity of Lake
Van.

Only those Christian Assyrians who are known
to the civilized world as Nestorians have become
identified as Assyrian nationals in the West. But
there are in Assyria a number of half -Moslem and
half-Christian sects who are usually regarded by
foreigners as Arabs or Kurds, but who really are
Assyrians. In addition there are the Jacobites,
another Christian Assyrian sect living in Syria
and Armenia, and a large Assyrian colony in In-
dia. All these various elements of the Assyrian

245

246 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

race have up to 1914 manifested no concerted
national consciousness. However, in the course
of the Great War a remarkable movement origi-
nated among the Assyrian immigrants in the
United States, where they number about twenty-
five thousand. They organized societies, founded
some periodicals, and began to press their histori-
cal claims, seeking autonomy under the protection
of the Great Powers.

Before the World War broke out there were not
more than three-quarters of a million of Assyrians
of all descriptions in Turkey, Persia, and Russia,
of whom more than two hundred thousand were
Nestorians. Nearly three-quarters of a million
more are said to inhabit the Malabar Coast of In-
dia. With these distant brothers included, the
Assyrians number not more than a million and
a half, the remainder of a once-powerful nation.

There is no question that historically the Assy-
rians have a perfect claim to the land they inhabit.
Forty-five hundred years ago their forefathers
lived in it and from it spread out and conquered
many kingdoms and peoples. The Bible records
the deeds of the Assyrian rulers. It was in 606
B. C. that Babylon and Media combined to over-
throw Assyria. However, it maintained a semi-
independent state until Persia overran it. Then
came the Roman, Byzantine and Persian empires.
The Assyrians first embraced Christianity during
the Apostolic period, and were gradually convert-

ASSYRIA 247

ed in the course of tlie first centuries. The new re-
ligion brought upon them the ire of the Persians,
who considered it a challenge to their own faith,
Zoroastrianism, or fire-worship. At the close of
the third century the Persians began to persecute
the Christians under them. The Assyrians were
massacred in large numbers. In one district alone
a hundred and sixty thousand Christians suffered
martyrdom. Hundreds of thousands migrated to
India. In the fourth century a Persian Emperor,
seeing the obstinacy with which the Christians
stuck to their faith, decreed that ' ' the Christians,
unless they would consent to worship the Persian
deities, should be required to pay an invariable
tax levied on each individual." At the beginning
of the fifth century the Christians in Persia en-
joyed a period of rest under the leadership of
Bishop Maruthas, who rendered valuable service
to the Persian Emperor by carrying on successful
negotiations with the Roman Emperors.

From the sixth to the eighth century the Assy-
rians converted many Asiatic races to the Nesto-
rian Church, exercising wide influence until the
rise of the Caliphate of Baghdad, which was estab-
lished by the followers of the new religion of Is-
lam. The Baghdad Caliphate was the center of
Arabian civilization for several centuries, and the
Assyrians enjoyed its protection, although their
church lost its power and decayed. In the thir-
teenth century the Mongol hordes emerged from

248 THE EESURRECTED NATIONS

the East, wrecking Arabian civilization and sack-
ing Baghdad. The Assyrians fled to the Zogras
Mountains and established a patriarchal seat at
Julamerk. Under their patriarchs the Nestorians
have maintained not only rehgious but also a cer-
tain amount of political autonomy.

In 1834 the American Presbyterians sent the
Eev. Justin Perkins to do missionary work among
the Nestorians. An American mission, consisting
of a college and a hospital, was later established
in Urumia. The American missionaries were fol-
lowed by an Anglican mission sent by the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury and by some Russian Ortho-
dox workers. The last were more political in-
triguers than missionaries. By promises of
special Russian protection to the Nestorians, they
won many of them over to the Orthodox Church.

The war brought terrible disaster to the Assy-
rians. At first the relations between the Kurds
and the Assyrians were undisturbed, and in the
winter of 1914-15 there was peace in the Taurus
highlands, although in January, 1915, the Turks
had captured the Persian city of Urumia and held
it for several months. * ' Then, in March, ' ' accord-
ing to Philips Price, ' ' two Assyrians arrived with
news from Russia at Kochanes, the village of the
Patriarch. Russia, they said, would come and
take the Assyrian highlands, and liberate the
Christians groaning under the tyranny of the
Turk. The Cossacks would be here any time now;

ASSYRIA 249

guns, ammunition, money, all would be forthcom-
ing; only let them rise up now against the com-
mon enemy of Christendom." The Assyrians
were undecided. Then Turkish agents appeared
among the Kurds and urged them to rise to the
defense of the Sultan. The Kurds also hesitated.
' * If we go to the Turks they will take us and make
us serve in Europe and Gallipoli. Let us rather
stay in our homes, or if we must fight, then let us
fight our neighbors and get all the loot we can."
This they proceeded to do as soon as some of the
Assyrian tribes went to join the Russians, and
war was thus declared by the Kurds against the
Assyrians.

Meanwhile the Turkish army under HaHl Bey,
which held Urumia, was defeated by a Russian
force at Salmas, Persia, and retreated, which
made it possible for the Russians to re-enter
Urumia in May. What followed was thus de-
scribed by a correspondent of ''The Near East"
in April, 1918 :

"The next Turkish offensive, in June, was an
attack, led by the Vali of Mosul, against the high-
landers of the Mar Shimun (the Assyrian Patri-
arch). The latter defended their narrow valley
against the invaders with the utmost valor. But
the Turks had with them some mountain artillery,
so that they were able to battle down the resist-
ance offered by the castles and churches; and at
length the Assyrians were forced to abandon their

250 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

valleys and to take refuge for three months in the
fastnesses of almost inaccessible mountains. Here,
amid the clouds, they preserved their freedom, but
they ran short of supplies. With a handful of
trusty warriors their brave Patriarch betook him-
self through untold perils to the Russian lines at
Salmas, Persia, to secure assistance. The fall of
Warsaw, however, had so weakened the Russians
that for the moment they were unable to render
effective aid; consequently Mar Shimun was
forced in November, 1915, to lead his needy flock
down to the plateau of northwestern Persia.
They scattered throughout the plains of Salmas
and Urumia; but here they did not find food
enough to go round; and they also lacked houses
and winter clothing. In those high altitudes,
where snow is plentiful, their sufferings were in-
tense, and within three months fifteen per cent,
of the refugees had died of disease or of starva-
tion.

''In January, 1916, Mar Shimun visited the
Grand Duke Nicholas, Commander-in-Chief of the
Russian Army of the Caucasus, who received him
with the honors due to the head of a Church and
of a nationality. The Russians requested the As-
syrian Highlanders to help defend the border
against the Turks and Kurds. As late as October,
1917, the Assyrians held the Castle of Chal, only
fifty miles from Mosul. But the withdrawal of
the Russian forces has brought great disaster to

ASSYRIA 251

the Assyrians, and thousands of women and chil-
dren are threatened with extermination."

From America and England large sums of
money were transmitted to Urumia to succor the
many thousands of ruined and hungry Assyrians.
But even more noble were the indefatigable efforts
of the American missionaries, Dr. Shedd and Dr.
Packard, who literally saved thousands of lives
through their influence with the Kurds. "Dr.
Packard," writes Philips Price, ''is six feet tall,
with the eye of an eagle and the courage of a lion.
He has traveled during the past thirteen years in
every remote valley of this wild Turco-Persian
borderland ; he is intimately acquainted with every
tribal chief of the Kurds, and can go among the
fiercest and most intractable of them, such is his
moral hold over these men, his medical skill, and
the confidence which they place in a man who is
not engaged in political intrigue."

A typical instance of the American missionary 's
work occurred early in 1915, when the Kurds fell
upon the Assyrian Christians after the Russian
evacuation of Urumia and massacred and plun-
dered thousands of them. Two thousand Assyr-
ians were besieged in one village by the Kurds.
Dr. Packard, at the risk of his life, ''went straight
to the Kurdish chief commanding the besiegers,
and begged him in the name of humanity to spare
the Christians, telling him that Mahommed had
never countenanced cruelty, and had always taught

252 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

his disciples to be kind and merciful. The effect
of a personal appeal for mercy from one who in-
spires confidence even in a wild mountaineer was
instantaneous. The Christians were liberated on
condition of giving up their arms."

The Assyrians sustained a great loss when the
head of their Church, Benjamin Mar Shimun, was
killed in March, 1918. However, a successor was
promptly elected and, under him, they made an
effort to effect a junction mth the British forces
in Mesopotamia.

The numerical weakness of the Assyrians neces-
sarily renders their problem small and easy of
solution. The crying Assyrian need is security
against attacks from the Kurds, Persians, Tar-
tars and Turks. But neither do the Assyrians
wish to be incorporated in the new Armenia, as
some Armenian nationalists desire. The Rev.
Joel Werda, President of the Assyrian National
Association in the United States, referring to the
movement for an Armenian- As Syrian union, said :

''It is needless to say that this will be an utter
impossibility. The Assyrians have no imperial
dreams, nor the thought of conquest. What the
Assyrians desire is a portion of their own land,
it matters not how small, with an outlet to the
sea. The mountains of Kurdistan (the so-called
Assyrian highlands), together with the plains of
the province of Mosul, with the Tigris giving us

I

ASSYRIA 253

an outlet to the sea, and a guarantee that we
would be protected from persecution and further
atrocities, would be sufficient to satisfy the rea-
sonable desire of the Assyrian nation. ' '

VI ^
KURDISTAN

KuEDisTAN, the land of the Kurds, comprises
mainly the Taurus mountain range which divides
Armenia from Mesopotamia. West of Kurdistan
is Cilicia, to the oast of it is the Persian province
of Azerbaijan. Of the two million Kurds that
lived in Turkey in 1914, more than half inhabited
the Taurus highlands. Another million were sub-
jects of Persia and Russia.

The Kurds are considered the original inliabi-
tants of Kurdistan, having inhabited the Taurus
mountains since the dawn of history. Already in
the days of the Assyrian empire they led a sepa-
rate national existence. Ancient Media was
largely a Kurdish power. Later they fell under
Persian influence, and absorbed much of the Per-
sian culture. The Kurds, although converted to
Islam, resisted the domination of the Baghdad
Caliphs in the ninth and tenth centuries. Kurdis-
tan reached its height under Saladin in the twelfth
century, when it became a vast kingdom extending
as far as Egypt and Yemen in the south and the
Black Sea in the north.

254

KUEDISTAN 255

With the arrival of the Turks in Middle Asia,
the larger portion of the Kurds fell under their
sway. However, they retained till the nineteenth
century virtual tribal independence. Eussia's
victorious pressure in Transcaucasia encouraged
them to revolt, but Turkey subdued them in 1834
and placed them under Turkish administrators.
Nevertheless Kurdistan still remained an autono-
mous country, ruled by Bedr Khan Bey, a power-
ful chief. In 1843 Bedr Khan Bey made an effort,
at the head of a large force, to drive the Turkish
administration out and set up in Kurdistan and
the adjoining Armenian districts an entirely in-
dependent kingdom. He failed, but his movement
was the beginning of modem Kurdish nationalism.

What gave a strong impetus to Kurdish nation-
alism was Armenian nationalism. The latter was
encouraged by Eussia during and after the war of
1877-78, Turkey therefore proceeded to encour-
age the Kurdish chief, Sheikh Obeidulla, to set up
a Kurdish principality and to propagate Kurdish
nationalism, so as to create hatred between the.
two races, in which alone was there safety for the
Ottoman hold on the Kurdish- Armenian lands. It
is an established fact that up to 1877 the Kurds
and the Armenians got along well together. But
after the race animosity had been aroused, Turkey
resumed its oppression of the Kurds, even as Eus-
sia had suspended its pro-Armenian policy and
began to persecute its Armenian subjects.

256 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

After the Turkish Revolution of 1908 an agree-
ment was reached between the Armenians and the
Kurds to support the Young Turkish government.
It is significant that the Kurds were the first to go
over to the opposition when the Young Turks
adopted the pohcy of Ottomanization for all the
races of the empire. Shortly before the outbreak
of the war in 1914 the Turkish authorities hanged
in Bitlis one of the last semi-independent chiefs
in Kurdistan, Sheikh Seyid Ali of Khizan, for
fomenting revolution.

When early in 1915 Turkish emissaries came to
the Kurds to incite them against the Christians,
they held out to them again many attractive prom-
ises. The Kurdish invasion of the plains of Uru-
mia, in which the Assyrians suffered so much,
was perpetrated, writes Philips Price, ''partly
with a view to loot, but also, as far as the tribal
chiefs were concerned, with the idea of creating a
large Kurdish kingdom, with themselves as the
rulers. It was undoubtedly a quite spontaneous
movement, called forth by the steady growth of
nationalism among the Kurds during the last
thirty years; but it is curious that it coincided
with the plan of Enver Pasha and the Young
Turks, set forth at the Erzerum Conference of
September, 1914, to create a chain of buffer states
under Ottoman suzerainty between Russia and
Turkey. Religious fanaticism probably played a
much smaller part in the movement than in previ-

KURDISTAN 257

ous years. The governing factor throughout
seems to have been nationality. It was in fact the
desire on the part of the Kurds to realize them-
selves as a unit in human affairs; and that idea
was far more powerful than the idea of Jihad
(Holy War)."

Mr. Price is probably the only European writer
with an up-to-date knowledge of the Kurdish prob-
lem. In his observations in ''War and Revolution
in Asiatic Russia" he continues as follows on the
subject of the Kurds : "Their chief mode of life is
cattle and horse-raising, for which abundant moun-
tain pasturage is necessary ; so a very large part
of them live as nomads, taking their flocks up to
the alpine meadows for the Summer, and retiring
in Winter to sheltered valleys in the foothills.
Being a strong and virile race, their numbers are
continually increasing, the pressure of population
and the insufficiency of pasturage thus making it
necessary for them to expand. The deserts of
Mesopotamia do not attract them, owing to the
absence under Turkish rule of any development of
irrigation in the basins of the lower Tigris and
Euphrates. On the other hand, to the north in
Armenia they find upland plateaux, where indus-
trious Armenian peasants grow corn, while on the
Persian table-land fertile oases abound, where
rice and the vine flourish. Everything at-
tracts them northward, and this is one of the
prime causes of political disorders in Greater Ar-

258 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

menia and northwest Persia, and can only be dealt
with by development of the irrigated lands of Mes-
opotamia, so as to give the Kurds a chance to
migrate south. . . . This necessity of the Kurds
for expansion is one of the most potent causes of
their national unrest. It is the absence of a guid-
ing and controlling hand that has turned this
natural movement into undesirable channels.

''It is customary in Europe to look upon the
Kurd as cruel and bloodthirsty by nature, and
given to creating disturbances for sheer deviltry's
sake. But when a race is situated in a countiy
lying between two greedy empires, both contin-
ually intriguing, bribing, threatening, invading,
and always thinking more of their own selfish
imperial interests than of the interests of the
people they are dealing with, is it likely that such
a race will fail to develop the character of fickle-
ness toward foreigners'? There is only one way
to secure the peace and development of Kurdis-
tan, and that is by the exercise of a little honesty,
that quality so rare in diplomacy. If the govern-
ing power deals fairly with the natives, improves
roads, irrigates the land, and builds schools, the
object of which is not merely to teach the children
garbled history about their own country, the
natives will then become confident, and turn their
activities to works of production rather than of
destruction. ' '

Tlie creation of an autonomous Armenia would

KURDISTAN 259

cut Kurdistan off from Turkey. The collapse of
the Russian empire and the establishment of au-
tonomous Georgian and Tartar republics in Trans-
caucasia abolished the Russian sphere of influence
in Persia. To unite resurgent Kurdistan with weak
Persia would be a sure sign of future wars in the
Middle East. To let the newly created Armenian
state rule Kurdistan would doom Armenia to
quick internal destruction. Armenia as it is,
drawn along strictly ethnographic lines, would
include a large number of Kurds. The incorpora-
tion of Kurdistan in it, would mean the creation
of an Armenian state in which there were two
Kurds to one Armenian. There remains the so-
lution of creating a united Kurdish government
in Kurdistan, under the protection, and with the
aid, of the Great Powers. Such a solution would
stabilize the new Armenia, it would give the
Kurds their rights, and would insure the develop-
ment of a civilization in Kurdistan.

VII
ARMENIA

The word Armenia, to which the Armenians owe
their name, is said to have been derived from the
two words ar (land) and meni (mountain) — the
land of mountains. Strictly speaking, however,
Armenia is a plateau, with an elevation of about
six thousand feet, lying between the Taurus moun-
tain range in the south and Anti-Taurus range in
the north. The Armenian plateau, running from
the east to the west, is easily accessible from Asia
and Europe, forming a sort of a highway in times
past between Central Asia and Greece.

Above the Armenian tableland rises the cele-
brated Mount Ararat, on which, according to the
Old Testament, Noah's ark rested. ''When Noah
stood on Ararat, ' ' picturesquely observes Edward
C. Little, "the great plateau of Armenia lay all
about him. To the northeast he could see the
fertile and beautiful valley of Araxes running 150
miles to the salt waters of the Caspian Sea. To
the southwest were the f ountainheads of the Tigris
and the Euphrates, and the hills and valleys and
the plateaux extending to the waters of the Medi-

263

264 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

terranean in the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon. To
the northwest was the Black Sea, and later the
famous city of Trebizond, while Persia lay to the
southeast."

Before the outbreak of the Great War, Armenia
was divided among Russia, Turkey, and Persia.
On the east the Armenians are bounded by Per-
sians and Tartars ; on the north by Georgians and
their Moslem half-brothers, the Lazes ; on the west
by Turks and Greeks and Anatolians; on the
south by Arabs, Kurds and Assyrians. These are
only the main ethnic boundaries of Armenia.

The real origin of the Armenians is shrouded in
the haze of the early history of mankind. The
Bible is replete with references to Armenia. It
is not yet fully established whether the Armenians
were the first inhabitants of Armenia or were an
Aryan race that invaded the region of Ararat and
assimilated its original population. According to
Alexander Polyhistor, 175 B. C, the Armenians
fought the Phoenicians twenty centuries before
Christ, and conquered them. An Irish publicist is
quoted to the effect that at the time of Phoenician
commerce with the West, Armenian traders were
among them, — that every Irish name one meets
ending in an, such as Brian, O'Callaghan, Sheri-
dan, as well as the Cornish names of Trevelyan,
Tresillian, and others, are but the remains of the
Armenian termination ian.

When Armenia emerges from the zone of doubt

ARMENIA 265

we find her a subject territory of Persia. Four
liundred and eighty years before Christ an Ar-
menian force was included in the hordes of Xer-
xes when he w^arred against Greece. Alexander
the Great, in his conquest of Persia, acquired Ar-
menia and made it a Macedonian province, ap-
pointing a Persian as its Governor. Upon the
death of Alexander the Great, when his huge em-
pire was divided, one of his generals, Neoptole-
mus, took possession of Armenia, in 323 B. C.
This was the beginning of the political indepen-
dence of the Armenians. With few interregnums,
the Kingdom of Armenia had more than seven-
teen centuries of existence.

The golden age of Armenian history was the
reign of Tigranes the Great, 94-56 B. C. He ex-
panded his dominions in every direction, conquer-
ing the neighboring kingdoms. At the zenith of
his career Armenia had a population of about
thirty million. Tigranes became known, accord-
ing to his coins, as King of Kings, and was the
mightiest monarch in Asia. His power, however,
came in conflict with the ambitions of Rome.
''Tigranes made the Republic of Rome tremble
before his prowess," wrote Cicero. Rome sent an
army to conquer Armenia and subdue Tigranes.
The gTeat Armenian ruler was defeated and made
a vassal of Rome. Upon his death he was suc-
ceeded by his son. At about the same time Parthia
became Rome's rival and Armenia was turned into

266 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

the field upon which East and West struggled for
supremacy. Later, in 226 A. D., the Persians con-
quered Parthia, and Annenia reverted to Persia.

The earliest nation in the world to adopt Chris-
tianity as a state religion was Armenia. The al-
most instantaneous conversion to Christianity of
the Armenian people occurred in 301 A. D., when
King Tiridates of Armenia was converted to the
new faith by Gregory the Parthian, called the
Illuminator, after having been miraculously
healed by him while suffering from a grave dis-
ease. The king then proclaimed Christianity as
the state religion.

The life of Armenia as a Christian state was one
of great service to the spread of Christianity in
the world. Its newly adopted religion almost im-
mediately provoked the hostility of the dominant
power, Persia, which finally involved the Christian
Emperor of Rome, Constantino the Great, in a
struggle against Persia. The result, however, was
the partition of Armenia, in 387 A. D. The Per-
sians persecuted the Armenians for their faith.
The Armenians resisted with all the fervor of
their primitive religion, and developed through it
that cohesion which bound them together into an
unprecedented national unit. Nothing could re-
duce the Armenians to a degenerative stage.
Neither the hordes of the Persians nor the fanati-
cism of the Mohammedan Arabs and Turks could
destroy their spirit. During the Armenian

ARMENIA 267

struggle against the Persians, the latter attempted
to induce them to give up Christianity and em-
brace Zoroastrianism (fire-worship), to which the
Armenians replied:

^'From this faith, no force can move us, —
neither angels nor men; neither sword, nor fire,
nor water, nor any deadly punishment. ... If
you leave us our faith, we shall accept no other
lord in place of you; but we shall accept no God
in place of Christ. If after this great confession,
you ask anything more of us, lo ! our lives are in
your power. From you, torments; from us, sub-
mission ; your sword, our necks. We are no better
than those who have gone before us, who sacrificed
their wealth and their lives for this testimony ! ' '

The crisis in the Persian-Armenian struggle
was reached in 451 A. D., when in the battle of
Avarair sixty-six thousand Armenians defeated
two hundred and twenty thousand Persians. This
won for them religious liberty. Although still
politically autonomous for two centuries after its
partition, Armenia owed its preservation mainly
to its Church. Already in the year 404 an Ar-
menian alphabet had been devised, and in 433 the
Bible was first rendered into Armenian from the
Greek. That translation is still known as the
'* Queen of Versions." The Church fostered Ar-
menian letters breathing a national spirit, which
contributed enormously to the preservation of the
race.

268 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

The first Arab wave to reach Armenia came in
636, immediately after the death of the Prophet.
Armenia passed swiftly into the hands of the
Caliphs, who appointed Arab and native gover-
nors to rule the country. In the ninth century one
such governor, Bagratid Ashot, of Jewish origin,
succeeded in consolidating part of Armenia into
the Kingdom of Ani, of which he was crowned king
by the Caliph Motamid in 885. Thus was founded
the small but progressive Armenian state of the
Middle Ages.

In the tenth century Armenia underwent fright-
ful treatment at the hands of the Arabs. The
Christian nations were afraid of the Moslem
hordes and did not come to the succor of Armenia.
The country was desolated and the Armenians
decimated. Hardly had it recovered from the
Arabs when a new invasion, that of the Seljuk
Turks, overran the Armenian lands. These bar-
barians plundered the cities and villages, putting
their inhabitants to the sword. Internal strife and
warfare against the Georgians and the Greeks
weakened the Armenian resistance, and finally the
Kingdom of Ani succumbed to Toghrul Bey, the
leader of the Seljuks, in 1064. The massacre of
the helpless population of Ani was one of the
bloodiest in human history. The ruins of the city
of Ani still stand. Luigi Villari, who visited them
in 1904, writes:

*'l took leave of this mai-velous city. It shows

ARMENIA 269

evidence of a building power and architectural
skill on the part of the ancient Armenians of the
highest order, and enables us to realize that this
people, in spite of the lamentable history of the
last six centuries, is a nation with a noble past.
To-day this spot, where proud kings once dwelt in
splendid courts and held sway over prosperous
lands and civilized subjects, where public life was
active and vigorous, is a crying wilderness. . . .
Is the state of Ani symbolical of that of the Ar-
menian nation, and are they destined at last to
disappear or be absorbed into other races, other
religions! I do not think so, for with all the suf-
fering and persecution they have undergone, they
still preserve a vigorous national life. ' '

During the invasions the Armenians migrated
to distant parts of Europe and Asia. Thousands
flew to the mountains to escape being butchered.
The wealthier and more enterprising elements
went to Byzantium, to the northern shores of the
Caspian Sea, to the Crimea, to Poland and to
Moldavia. It was a dispersal from which Arme-
nia has never recovered. The marvel of this
period of martyrdom for the Armenian people was
that any of them were left alive in their own
country and able to perpetuate their national ex-
istence. "For more than three centuries after
the appearance of the Seljuk," observes a writer,
''Armenia was traversed by a long succession of
nomad tribes, whose one aim was to secure good

270 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

pasturage for their flocks on their way to the
richer lands of Asia Minor. The cultivators were
driven from the plains, agriculture was destroyed
and the country was seriously impoverished when
the ruin was completed by the wholesale butcheries
of Timur (Tamerlane)."

Among the emigrants toward the end of the
eleventh century was one Eupen, a relation of the
last king of Ani. He founded a colony of Arme-
nians in 1080 in the Cilician Taurus which devel-
oped later into the kingdom of Cilicia and became
known as Lesser Armenia. The first Holy Cru-
sade was decreed by Pope Urban II in the year
1095. Lesser Armenia, already waging defensive
warfare against the Seljuks, generously co-
operated with the Crusaders, for which her king,
Gostandin, was knighted and subsequently created
a marquis. Cilicia was ever ready to assist the
Western Christians in their wars for the Holy
Land. Had Lesser Armenia been supported by
the Christian states in its strenuous efforts to re-
sist the Ottoman movement westward, the Turk
might never have played the role he did. Unfor-
tunately the Byzantine Empire was unfriendly,
even hostile to the Armenians, being desirous of
absorbing the Armenian Church. The Armenians
resisted domination by the Greek Church, as well
as that of the Roman Church, which adopted a
similar attitude, demanding the submission of the

ARMENIA 271

Armenian Episcopate to the rule of the Supreme
Pontiff.

"It may be said with absolute truth," writes
W. L. Williams, ''that the chief difficulty en-
countered by this tiny Christian State, this out-
post of the Christian Church, during its whole
career, arose from the determination of the two
Christian organizations in the East and West to
absorb this national Church which clung so obsti-
nately to its own creed and to its separate and in-
dependent existence. When after 300 years of
struggle against foes within and without the
Lesser Kingdom of Armenia disappeared and the
political existence of this people vanished, it was
in a large measure owing to the ecclesiastical in-
trigues incessantly carried on by the Roman and
Greek Churches. They weakened and rendered
impotent the State at a moment when unity was
called for, and the whole strength of the people
was needed to meet their Moslem foes thundering
at their gates."

The Cilician kingdom was through the Cru-
sades brought into close relations with France,
and its kings even married into French nobility.
After many vicissitudes the life of Lesser Arme-
nia was ingloriously terminated. In 1375 she was
invaded by the Mamelukes of Egypt and her king,
Leo the Sixth, was taken into captivity. After a
prolonged imprisonment he was released, came to
Europe an exile a-nd died in 1393 in Paris, where

272 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

he lies buried in the Abbey of St. Denis. Thus
did the last vestige of Armenian independence
pass away.

The Tartar hordes were next to sweep over Ar-
menia. In 1401 Tamerlane had left Asia Minor
a frightful wreck. The Ottoman Turks followed
the Tartars. Armenia was the first to suffer at
the hands of the savage invaders that rushed
from Central Asia toward Christian Europe. And
still Armenia persisted in existing. If anything,
the horrible ordeals which she underwent made
her more invulnerable and fuller of vitality. As
soon as an invader had passed, the Armenians
would emerge from mountain crags and hidden
valleys by the thousand to perpetuate their kind,
to revive and restore their land, only to be again
slaughtered and devastated by a new tide of in-
vasion. For several centuries the Turks and the
Persians battled on the fields of Armenia, soak-
ing her soil with their blood and that of its in-
habitants. In the seventeenth century a Persian
king, retreating before the Turks, and fearing
lest the latter should rescue the Armenians and
use them against the Persians, decided to trans-
fer the Armenian population to Persia. Hundreds
of thousands of them were driven in front of the
Persian army till they reached the River Araxes,
over which there was no bridge. The Turkish army
was rapidly moving against the Persians. The
Commander of the latter. Shah Abbas, therefore

ARMENIA 273

ordered Ms forces to drive the Armenian multi-
tude into the river, thus affording an opportunity
to those who were able to swim to save their lives.

In 1639 a treaty between Persia and Turkey
transferred the eastern part of Armenia to the
latter power. In that part was located the prov-
ince of Erivan, the chief city of which, Etchmiad-
zin, is the ecclesiastical and cultural center of
the country. This section was in 1828 handed over
by Turkey to Russia, whose interest in Armenia
and the Armenians dated from 1722, when Peter
the Great sent an expedition into Transcaucasia
to capture Baku. Persecuted by the Moslems, the
Armenians, through their patriarch, applied to
Peter for permission to settle in the Russian do-
minions. Since then Russia steadily pressed
southward against Turkey and Persia, and the
Armenians moved northward just as steadily, so
that at the outbreak of the Great War there were
more than a million and a half Armenians in
Transcaucasia, a considerable portion of whom
settled in Georgia and the Tartar districts in the
vicinity of Baku. The differences among the Ar-
menians, Georgians and Tartars in the Caucasus
spring mainly from the peaceful Armenian con-
quest of the region, just as the differences between
the Armenians and their southern neighbors, the
Kurds, are due to the pressure of the latter north-
ward.

When Russia acquired Georgia at the beginning

274 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS J

of the nineteenth century, it annexed a large Ar-
menian population. In 1813 it occupied the Per-
sian province of Karabagh and in 1829 the Turk-
ish province of Akhaltsykh, both of which con-
tained many Armenian communities. With the
acquisition of the province of Kars from Turkey,
in 1878, Russia's interest in the Armenians as-
sumed definite form. The modern Armenian prob-
lem may be said to date from that year.

The Russo-Turkish treaty of San Stefano,
which terminated the war of 1877-78, provided that
Turkey should ' ' carry into effect, without further
delay, the improvements and reforms demanded
by local requirements in the provinces inhabited
by Armenians and guarantee their security from
the Kurds and Circassians." A Russian army of
occupation was to see to it that this provision was
carried out. However, Turkish diplomacy, sup-
ported by Western powers, succeeded in annulling
the treaty of San Stefano, and substituted that of
Berlin. It was at the time a blow to Russia and a
diplomatic triumph for Great Britain. ''Great
Britain went further," according to the British
publicist, W. L. Williams. ' ' By the secret Cyprus
Convention (June 4, 1878), the Sultan promised
to introduce necessary reforms ' for the protection
of Christians and other subjects of the Porte' in
Asia Minor. As the price for guaranteeing the
integrity of Turkish territory in Asia Minor,
Cyprus was ceded to Great Britain. Time and

ARMENIA 275

events have shown it to be one of the gravest
political blunders in our annals. But what were
its immediate practical effects 1 It encouraged the
Armenians to look to the European Powers and
not to Russia alone for protection; and the Con-
vention, which did not mention the Armenians,
was regarded as placing them under the special
protection of Great Britain. It was a betrayal of
the Armenians by the Power to which they were
bidden to look for deliverance from the basest
and cruelest tyranny."

The protection given by Russia to the Arme-
nians proved harmful to them. Already during
the war of 1877-78 the Ottoman authorities insti-
gated massacres of Armenians in Turkey who
were suspected, not without reason, of being pro-
Russian. A national movement was born among
the Armenians. Secret organizations and connnit-
tees were established in the large cities of Arme-
nia, which were under the influence of nationalist
societies formed in Paris, Geneva, and Tiflis. Rus-
sia at first encouraged this Armenian movement,
which was anti-Turkish, but not for long. During
the reign of Alexander III the reactionary policy
of the Tsar for Russia was gradually extended to
all the dominions of the empire. The Caucasus
did not escape the new era, and the Armenians
were among the first victims, their schools and
Church suffering from governmental persecution.
The Armenians soon found themselves between

276 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

two fires. Abandoned by their erstwhile protec-
tor, the Armenians became an easier prey to the
Turkish government, which executed a series of
bloody massacres in 1894-96 that cost about one
hundred thousand Armenian lives. i

A large emigration from Armenia proper began
in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Tens
of thousands of Armenians left for foreign coun-
tries, while many more thousands migrated to
European Turkey and Russia, where they adapted
themselves quickly to new conditions and led in
every field of endeavor. Writing in 1905, Luigi
Villari called attention to the rise of a wealthy
Armenian middle class. "We find them (Arme-
nians)," he observed, "as bankers, merchants,
shopkeepers, manufacturers, lawyers, doctors,
teachers, engineers, and officials all over the Cau-
casus, and even in European Russia. The Baku
oil industry is largely due to Armenian enterprise ;
at Tiflis, the ancient capital of Georgia, the Ar-
menians form over a third of the population, have
practically all the business of the town in their
hands, own most of the house property, and con-
stitute 80 per cent, of the town council. Even in
the Russian army Armenians occupied high posi-
tions; the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian
forces in the Asiatic campaign of 1877 was Gen-
eral Loris Melikoff, an Armenian from Lori, and
one of his ablest lieutenants was General Ter-
Gukassoff, also an Armenian. The same Loris

ARMENIA 277

Melikoff afterward became chief minister to Al-
exander II ; he was all-powerful for a time, and is
believed to have drawn np a constitution which
would have been promulgated had not the Tsar
been assassinated in 1881."

Even in Turkey, in spite of all the persecutions,
Armenians attained the highest places and hon-
ors. According to Arshag Madhesian, the first
newspaper ever published in Turkey was an Ar-
menian periodical. The introduction of Turkish
printing and the establishment of theaters were
accomplished by Armenians. It was due to the
collaboration of two great Armenian statesmen
that the Turkish constitution was framed by Mid-
hat Pasha. Armenian philologists evolved the
Turkish grammar, while for many years the chief
directors of the Turkish arsenals and government
mint were Armenians. The fine stuffs, the em-
broideries, the tapestry and the jewelry admired
in Europe as Turkish products are declared to
be almost exclusively manufactured by Armenians.

The rise of a large Armenian bourgeoisie in
Transcaucasia could not have occurred without
the appearance of a proletariat there. The latter
was, however, not entirely Armenian. The Tar-
tars and other slow races of the Caucasus made
up a large part of the labor class which became
especially strong in the oil region around Baku.
The racial difference between the Tartars and Ar-
menians, accentuated by their religious difference.

278 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

was therefore, broadly speaking, further empha-
sized by an economic cleavage. The Russian
bureaucrats knew how to make use of these differ-
ences when the Armenians in Transcaucasia,
thanks to numerous repressive measures carried
out against them by Tsarism in 1896-1901, had
been turned into active revolutionists. Race
hatred was aroused by secret agents and Black
Hundreds in the industrial centers, especially
Baku, which resulted in the notorious pogroms of
1905, when the Tartars fell upon the Armenians
in southeastern Transcaucasia and massacred
many of them under the very eyes of the Russian
officials. Millions of dollars' worth of property
was destroyed and thousands of lives were lost
that year in the Armenian-Tartar fights. It was
only in 1906 and afterward, when Georgian, Tartar
and Armenian alike were subjected to Tsaris-
tic oppression, that the Tartars realized that they
had been used by the Russians to suppress the
Transcaucasian revolutionary movement and
strengthen the yoke of the Russian autocracy.

The unsuccessful revolution of October, 1905,
aroused among the Tartars a new outlook on life,
while the Armenians found themselves more
closely in sympathy with the struggling Russian
people. In Turkey it embittered further the Ar-
menian opposition toward the Ottoman govern-
ment. But before long, in 1908, Turkey was trans-
formed from a despotic autocracy into a consti-

ARMENIA 279

tutional monarchy. Abdul Hamid was deposed
and the Young Turks were at the hehn. Naturally
the Armenians turned toward Constantinople,
hoping for a new era from the seemingly rejuve-
nated Porte. The Turkish Armenians, mostly
peasants and traders, arrived at a friendly under-
standing with the Kurds, both parties agreeing
to support the new government in the Turkish
parliament. But the Young Turks, instead of sat-
isfying the legitimate local demands of the various
nationalities of the empire, embarked upon their
disastrous policy of centralization and Ottomani-
zation. The result was the alienation of the sub-
ject races, the Arabs, the Syrians, the Kurds, and
the Armenians. Many of the latter turned to Rus-
sia, believing justly that sooner or later a free
Russia would emerge, and that it would liberate
the oppressed nationalities of the empire.

Then came the Great War. The Armenians
were about equally divided between Turkey and
Russia. What happened in those early days of the
world struggle has been told as follows by the
only foreign observer in the Caucasus during the
war, M. Philips Price, in his ' ' War and Revolution
in Asiatic Russia":

''Early in August, 1914, the Tiflis Armenians
seem to have decided that a Russo-Turkish war
was inevitable, and thereupon the Dashnakist (of
the great Armenian party, Dashnaktsution) lead-
ers there at once offered 25,000 volunteers to

280 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

assist the Russians in conquering the Armenian
vilayets. This offer was made before the out-
break of the war with Turkey, and in the interval
the volunteers were busy training and forming at
the various centers in the Caucasus. At the end
of October, when Turkey came into the war, prepa-
rations had been so far advanced that Andranik,
the famous revolutionary leader from Turkey, at
the head of the first battalion, took part with the
Russians in the advance through northwest Per-
sia, capturing Serai early in November. Mean-
while five more battalions had been formed and
were ready to leave for the front, as soon as they
could get rifles and equipment. Fifty per cent,
of these volunteers were Armenians who had left
Turkey, Bulgaria and Rumania since the out-
break of the European war, and had come to the
Caucasus to offer their services."

The Ottoman government became anxious to ar-
rive at an understanding with its Armenian sub-
jects. Enver Pasha delegated three representa-
tives to Erzerum, who proposed that Armenia stay^
neutral and that the Armenians remain loyal toi
their respective governments, those of Russia and
Turkey. The Erzerum Armenians agreed, but a;
few days later the Turkish delegation made an-
other proposal, intended to win all the Armenians
over to the Ottoman side. They produced a
scheme for the conquest of Transcaucasia and thei
erection of a united autonomous Armenia, pro-

ARMENIA 281

vlded the Armenians allied themselves with the
Porte. The skeptical Armenians refused to con-
clude such a pact. The Young Turks then de-
manded that the Armenians keep from going over
to Russia and form anti-Turkish units there. But
the Turkish Armenians were not influential
enough to stop the activities of their Russian
brethren in Tiflis, who claimed to have obtained a
verbal promise of Armenian autonomy from the
Russian government. It was this promise that
made thousands of Armenians desert from Turkey
and join the volunteers in Russia, which in turn
formed the foundation for the series of unparal-
leled atrocities perpetrated by the Turkish govern-
ment upon its Armenian population.
I The Turks resorted to the old method of insti-
gating race hatred. The Kurds, who formed a
very considerable portion of the population of
Armenia, were, together with the Turks and other
Moslems, incited against the Armenians. In 1915
the Turkish and Russian armies executed several
important movements on the Transcaucasian
front, resulting in the destruction of many Ar-
menian settlements when the Turks retreated and
the wiping out of large Kurdish communities by
the revengeful Armenians and Russians upon their
advance. It was in 1915, therefore, that the Ar-
menian-Kurdish struggle assumed a definite form.
It grew so relentless in the following years that
the two races simply waged a campaign of mutual

282 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

exteiinination. Of course, the Armenians had
against them the Ottoman government, which soon
initiated, organized and carried out the systematic
deportation and murder of entire Armenian com-
munities. ''Homes were literally uprooted,"
wrote Henry Morgenthau, United States Ambas-
sador to Turkey, of the persecutions. "Families
were separated, men killed, women and girls vio-
lated daily. Children were thrown into the rivers
or sold to strangers by their mothers to save them
from starvation. The facts contained in the re-
ports received at the Embassy from absolutely
trustworthy eye-witnesses surpass the most
beastly and diabolical cruelties ever before per-
petrated or imagined in the history of the world."
The estimates of the number of victims differ
greatly. It would, however, seem that not less
than half a million and probably three-quarters
of a million of non-combatant Armenians perished
as a result of the Turkish-Kurdish massacres and
persecutions. In retaliation probably a quarter of
a million of civilian Kurds and Turks were exter-
minated by the Russians and Armenians in their
victorious advances of 1915 and 1916. Two years
after the outbreak of the war, there were only
800,000 Armenians left in Turkish Armenia out of
a total of 1,800,000. Only 250,000 Kui-ds out of
a total of 900,000 inhabiting the vilayets of Van,
Bitlis, Erzerum and Kharput remained. Hun-
dreds of thousands of the former saved themselves

I

AEMENIA 283

by moving into Transcaucasia, while similar num-
bers of the latter were saved by migrating into
Anatolia and Kurdistan. Nevertheless, the loss of
human life in Armenia was appalling on both
sides.

Meanwhile the Armenians in Russia not only
failed to receive autonomy from the Tsar's gov-
ernment, but were subjected to the reactionary
measures from which all Russia suffered in 1916.
This oppression created the ground for an under-
standing among the Armenians, the Tartars and
the Georgians. All the three nationalities of
Transcaucasia were now opposed to the govern-
ment and engaged in secret revolutionary activi-
ties. When the Revolution finally came, in March,
1917, the Caucasus was ripe for it. The old gov-
ernors and officials were swept away with the first
tide, and Grand Duke Nicholas, the Commander-
in-Chief of the Caucasus armies, soon followed
them into oblivion. The oppressed nationalities
awoke to a new life. Revolutionary councils of
soldiers, workmen and peasants sprang up
throughout Transcaucasia. A joint executive
council met in Tiflis. It supported the Russian
Provisional Government until the rise of the Bol-
shevik! to power in November, 1917, when the
Russian army abandoned the Transcaucasian
front and the Armenians were left to defend
themselves.

In January, 1918, there met in Tiflis elected rep-

284 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

resentatives of the Georgians, Tartars and Ar-
menians, and constituted themselves into a
supreme Transcaucasian Diet. This did not pre-
vent each of the three races from developing its
own institutions and national autonomy. On Jan-
uary 31 delegates representing most of the Ar-
menian provinces met in Erzerum, where the Ar-
menian legions were concentrated, and declared
Armenian independence. Meanwhile Turkey had
concluded a peace with the Bolshevist government
at Brest-Litovsk by which Russia was compelled
to cede to Turkey parts of the provinces of Batum,
Kars and Ardahan, while the Ukrainian troops
which occupied Trebizond retired as soon as their
government concluded a separate peace with the
Central Powers. Armenia and Georgia were
directly affected by the pacts. A verbal agree-
ment was reached between the Armenians and
Georgians according to which the former were to
defend the Erzerum line and the latter the Trebi-
zond front. When the Turks advanced, how-
ever, the Georgians did not show up at Trebizond
and the Armenians were left alone to fight the
Turks. They offered heroic resistance, but in
March Erzerum fell and the Ottoman forces moved
to occupy the provinces ceded to them at Brest-
Litovsk.

A crisis was soon reached in the life of the
Transcaucasian Diet. The Tartars were not dis-
posed to fight the Turks who had encouraged the

AKMENIA 285

Tartar national movement. The Georgians took
the view that Transcaucasia was not in a condition
to oppose the Turkish realization of the Brest-
Litovsk provisions and the Armenians were ad-
vised by Ghegechkori, President of the Diet, to
drop all resistance. This advice was not followed
by all the Eussian Armenians, who together with
their Turkish brethren continued to harass the
Ottoman invaders. The latter continued to ad-
vance, occupying territory which had never been
legally surrendered to them. This finally brought
the Turks into conflict with the Diet, which ad-
dressed to them a request for peace. The Turks
demanded as a preliminary condition for peace
negotiations "that the Diet should declare the
secession of Transcaucasia from Russia and pro-
claim the independence of the Caucasus, " so as to
enable them to negotiate with sovereign peoples.
The Diet agreed to do so against the protests of
the Armenians, who thereupon left it in a body.
In spite of the terrible ravages of forty months
of war, the Armenians were able to offer such vio-
lent resistance to the Turks that the Ottoman gov-
ernment, in July, 1918, consented to sign a peace
with the Armenians, recognizing the "Armenian
Independent Republic of Ararat," with its capital
at Erivan.

Then, in October, Turkey surrendered to the
Allies. The armistice provision calling for Allied
occupation of the six Armenian vilayets in Turkey

286 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

in case of disorder did not satisfy the Armenian
nationalists as radical enough. They dispatched
a military mission to the Allied countries, headed
by General Torcom, who issued on November 12,
at Archangel, before departing for western
Europe, the following remarkable manifesto:

"In December, 1917, the Russian armies of the
Caucasus abandoned the Armenian front. On
January 31, 1918, although having at our disposal
only very limited forces, owing to the fact that the
state of anarchy prevailing did not allow us to
employ all our soldiers, but in full possession of
a large part of Armenian territories, we solemnly
proclaimed at Erzerum, in the presence of troops,
the population, and the provincial Armenian dele-
gates, the independence of Armenia, which in-
cludes Greater Armenia, Lesser Armenia, and
Cilician Armenia.

"We placed these countries under the protec-
tion of four Allied powers. Great Britain, the
United States, France, and Italy. Deserted by the
Russians, betrayed by the Georgians, and attacked
on all sides by the Turco-German forces, Kurds,
Tartars, and twenty other races intent on our ex-
termination, we have fought with a handful of gal-
lant soldiers for the independence of our country.
We were away from our great western Allies, and
were without the least possibility of receiving help.
However, our faith in the final triumph of our
cause, which was also the cause of all peoples out-

ARMENIA 287

raged by the barbaric Teutons, never failed
us. . . .

'*At the cost of innumerable difficulties I have
crossed the vast Russian territory, which is seeth-
ing with unrest. I now come to you charged with
a sacred trust and mission. I bring to you the
Armenian flag. My mission is to gather round this
flag, which has become the emblem of our suffer-
ing, our faith, and our burning thirst for liberty,
an Armenian army of 100,000 men. We must help
our glorious Allies to take possession from the
Mediterranean to the Black Sea, of all Armenian
countries, where our martyrs are to be counted by
hundreds of thousands.

''Armenians, I come to ask you to make the
supreme effort. . . . Armenia does not wish to
die. She wishes to become great, powerful, and
respected. She desires, at least, to take her place,
which has been so dearly bought, among civilized
peoples. In order to bring to a successful end the
work of attaining independence for Armenia
amidst a ruined country, Armenia wishes every
one of yon to do your duty. After having been for
so long a sorrow-stricken witness of Armenia's
martyrdom, the hour has at last struck when the
entire world will look with admiration on the re-
birth of Armenia."

On December 4, 1918, the Armenian National
Delegation, formed in Paris, under the presidency
of Boghos Nubar, declared the independence of

288 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

integral Armenia and Cilicia under the collective
protection of the Allies and the United States. On
December 29, Foreign Minister Pichon, of
France, announced: "Our rights are incontest-
able in Armenia, Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine.
They are based on historic conventions and on
more recent contracts. ' ' These contracts were the
secret treaties and understandings concluded
among the Allies in 1915-17, whereby France was
' ' to guide the affairs ' ' of Armenia, Syria and the
Lebanon. Pichon 's announcement occasioned a
great stir among the Armenians, who protested
strongly against being put, without their knowl-
edge, under the protection of a single European
Power.

The Armenians realize that without outside help
they cannot expect to set up a durable government,
but they wish it to come from international author-
ity. However, even with the aid of the Allies and
the United States it would be a most difficult task
to define Armenia's exact boundaries ethnographi-
cally. If Armenia should be reconstituted on his-
toric lines, then against three million Armenians
it would comprise at least five millions of Kurds,
Turks, Greeks, Persians, and other races. It is
possible to carve out an ethnographic Armenia in
which the Armenians would be in the majority,
but in order to do so successfully the Armenians
would have to forget their historical claims and
to consent to the creation of an autonomous Kurd-

ARMENIA 289

ish state in Kurdistan. As the Kurds in Armenia
are still largely nomadic, the erection of an auton-
omous Kurdistan would reabsorb the Kurds who
migrated from there to settle on the Armenian
plateau. An ethnographic Armenia would in-
clude those parts of Georgia and Azerbaijan,
where the Armenians predominate, although his-
torically these parts are not Armenian; it would
necessarily fail to include certain historical sec-
tions of Armenia where the Kurds now predomi-
nate.

Historic justice and a powerful national con-
sciousness are the strongest arguments for Ar-
menian independence. Culturally, the Armenians
are unquestionably fit to lead in the development
of the Middle East. Valery Brusov, the Russian
poet, who has studied the Armenian literature and
history, says that in spite of the horrors they have
undergone in the course of their long history, the
Armenians have created an original culture and
have given to the world one of the richest liter-
atures, unfortunately not sufficiently studied.
"The greatest worth of the Armenian literature,"
he adds, ''lies perhaps in its lyrical poetry of the
Middle Ages — a magnificent synthesis of sober
Greek harmony and Oriental exuberance and
splendor. There is no doubt that when it is
brought to the knowledge of the great public, the
lyrical poetry of Mediaeval Armenia will be rec-
ognized as one of the treasures of humanity."

290 THE RESUERECTED NATIONS

The Armenian national will finds its strongest
expression in Armenia's poetry and press. All
over the world Armenian apostles of independence
have carried the message of their people to the
civilized nations. The passionate love for their
country is the keynote of most of the modern Ar-
menian poets. A fine example of this is presented
by the following poem, from the pen of Khorene
Nar Bey de Lusignan, a descendant of the last
Armenian kings, and rendered into English by
Alice Stone Blackwell:

If a sceptre of diamond, a glittering crown,
Were mine, at thy feet I would lay them both down.
Queen of queens, 0 Armenia!

If a mantle of purple were given to me,
A mantle for kings, I would wrap it round thee,
Poor Armenia, my mother!

If the fire of my youth and its sinews of steel
Could return, I would offer its rapture and zeal
All to thee, my Armenia!

Had a lifetime of ages been granted to me,
I had given it gladly and freely to thee,
0 my life, my Armenia!

Were I offered the love of a maid lily-fair,
I would choose thee alone for my joy and my care,
My one love, my Armenia!

Were I given a crown of rich pearls, I should prize,
Far more than their beauty, one tear from thine eyes,
0 my weeping Armenia !

ARMENIA 291

If freedom unbounded were proffered to me,
I would choose still to share thy sublime slavery,
O my mother, Armenia!

Were I offered proud Europe, to take or refuse.
Thee alone, with thy griefs on thy head, would I choose
For my country, Armenia!

Might I choose from the world where my dwelling

should be,
I would say. Still thy ruins are Eden to me,
My beloved Armenia !

Were I given a seraph's celestial lyre,
I would sing with my soul, to its chords of pure fire,
Thy dear name, my Armenia !

VIII

GEORGIA

It is only a little more than a century since the
kingdom of Georgia lost its independence and was
made a virtual province of the Russian Empire,
and yet Georgia is a terra incognita to the West-
em peoples. Among the minor races of the former
Russian state the Georgians were one of the most
progressive and vigorous national units. The
Georgians are a people with rich traditions, a
keen national consciousness, and a high state of
culture.

The home of the Georgians is western Transcau-
casia. They and their kindred races practically
occupy the entire Transcaucasian coast on the
Black Sea. In the south they adjoin the Arme-
nians. In the east their neighbors are the Tar-
tars. The Caucasus range is north of them. There
are nearly two and a half million Georgians of
all descriptions in Transcaucasia. The various
Georgian tribes, speaking diverse dialects, have
in recent years been fusing together and adopting
one literary language.

The Georgians belong to the Arj^an family.

292 ^

GEORGIA 293

They settled in their present country thousands of
years ago, arriving from the great Iranian pla-
teau. Their civilization is the oldest in the Cauca-
sus, if not in the entire world. Physically they are
the finest typification of the white race. The men
are athletic and handsome, the women beautiful.

The history of Georgia as an independent state
goes back to biblical times. According to Geor-
gian tradition, their kingdom was founded by a
descendant of Noah. It was only during the third
century B. C, however, that Georgia became iden-
tified with recorded history. Alexander the Great
conquered it and left one of his generals to rule
it. This foreign government was overthrown by
a national rising under the leadership of the popu-
lar hero, Pharmabazes, who founded the first
Georgian dynasty. In the second century B. C,
his descendant was overthrown and the throne
passed into the hands of an Armenian prince. The
union with Armenia embroiled Georgia in a war
with Rome. General Pompey invaded Georgia and
subdued it, but not for long. Nearly two centuries
later Rome w^aged another campaign against
Georgia. In the third century a Persian prince,
Miriam, by marriage succeeded the Armenian dy-
nasty and established the Sasanid ruling house.
It was during his rule that Georgia first received
the Christian missionary named Nina. The
Greek emperor sent a delegation of priests to bap-
tize the Georgian king and people. Christianity

294 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

was then introduced into Georgia, dividing its
many tribes into Christian and non-Christian fac-
tions. The latter came under the influence of Zo-
roastrianism. With the support of Persia these
waged bitter warfare against their Christian
brethren, overrunning Georgia. It was a Persian
general who founded, in 379, the city of Tiflis. In
time the Christians gained ascendancy, and to-
ward the end of the fifth century the fire-wor-
shipers were subdued and Christianity firmly
established. King Vakhtang Gurgaslan, the Wolf-
Lion, 446-499, made Georgia a great power. He
established a patriarchate at Mtzkhet, which was
recognized by Emperor Justinian of Byzantium
as an independent Church.

Georgia was again menaced by Persia during
the sixth century. The people appealed to Byzan-
tium for help, which was furnished in the person
of an Armenian prince named Guaram, who gov-
erned Georgia as a Byzantine viceroy. He was the
founder of the dynasty of Bagratids, which ended
with the passing away of Georgian independence.
Beginning with the seventh century Georgia was
in turn invaded by Arabs, Turks, and Tartars.
The country was split into many principalities.
Until the year 1000 the Arabs dominated Georgia.
It was freed and reunited by Kings David and
Bagrat in the eleventh century, but was soon con-
quered and devastated by the Turks, who were
finally driven out in 1080 and a powerful Georgian

GEORGIA 295

state, embracing practically entire Transcaucasia,
was erected by King David the Renovator. He
laid the foundations of Georgian civilization,
building churches, founding schools, encouraging
arts and learning. His successor expanded
the kingdom's boundaries. Georgia reached its
height of prosperity and civilization under Queen
Thamara, who ascended the throne in 1184. Her
name is ''still venerated as a glorious, if half-
legendary tradition wherever the Georgian tongue
is spoken," writes Luigi Villari; ''almost every
church and every castle is attributed to her, and
a whole host of legends has gathered about her
personality. . . . She waged war successfully
against both the Turks and the Greeks, and after
the fall of the Byzantine Empire at the hands of
the Crusaders she helped to form the empire of
Trebizond. But at her death, in 1212, the edifice,
laboriously raised, crumbled once more."

The Mongols appeared on the scene. The
hordes of Genghiz Khan laid the country waste.
Early in the fourteenth century Georgia recovered
and prospered. But again the Mongols, under
Tamerlane, swept over the land, devastating it
with fire and sword. In the fifteenth century the
Mongols were expelled by King Alexander I, who,
at his death, in 1442, divided his kingdom among
his three sons. One of these principalities, Kakhe-
tia, applied to the Muscovite Tsar, Ivan III, for
protection, in 1492, when the Turks and the Per-

296 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

sians were playing havoc with Georgia. The Per-
sians finally gained control and ruled through
local princes. Early in the eighteenth century the
Georgian king, Vakhtaug VI, reigning by the
grace of the Persians, established close relations
with Russia, hoping to free Georgia from the for-
eign yoke and save his people from the fanatical
Moslems. Vakhtang concluded an alliance with
Peter the Great in 1722, declared his independence
of Persia, and sent an army of thirty thousand to
cooperate with the Russians against the Persians.
Peter the Great betrayed the Georgians by making
a separate peace with Persia in 1724, recognizing
her suzerainty over Georgia, with an eye to the
ultimate absorption of Georgia by Russia. The
Turks, gaining power while the Persians were
busy elsewhere, penetrated Georgia and compeUed
Vakhtang to abdicate. However, shortly after-
ward, the Persians expelled the Turks and placed
Irakli II on the Georgian throne. This ruler was
the last to raise his country again to a high state
of prosperity. He is described as ' ' one of the most
remarkable men of his time, who excited the ad-
miration of all Europe; under him Georgia re-
vived and prospered, and became for the last time
a powerful and independent state. Culture and
civilization spread, order and unity were achieved,
and the neighboring Tartar khanates reduced to
vassalage. ' '

He declared Georgia's complete independence

GEORGIA 297

when Persia collapsed. The Turkish danger, how-
ever, compelled him to seek support in Europe. He
sent two missions to Austria, but failed to obtain
aid. He was compelled to turn to Russia, in 1769.
Russia's policy toward Georgia was formulated
by Catherine the Great as follows in her instruc-
tions to the Russian representatives in the Cau-
casus : ' ' Do nothing likely to strengthen Georgia. ' '
Following these instructions the Russians, having
allied themselves with the Georgians against the
Turks, deserted the former on the battlefield.
After valiant fighting, with varying fortune,
Georgia was at the mercy of the Turks and Per-
sians. Tiflis, the capital, was captured in 1795
and burned. Irakli died heart-broken in 1798,
leaving a feeble kingdom to his son George, who
was compelled to enter into negotiations with Tsar
Paul, placing Georgia under Russian protection.
A treaty was drawn up in 1799, providing for the
transfer of Georgia to the Russian Empire, on
condition that "the crown" was to be vested in
George and his heirs, who were to retain the chief
authority in the country, but without legislative
powers; the people were to enjoy immunity from
taxation for twelve years ; the number of Russian
troops in Georgia was not to exceed six thousand,
and military service for the Georgians was to take
the form of a national militia; the Georgian
Church was to be independent, and Georgian was

298 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

to remain the official and educational language."
(Luigi Villari.)

The treaty was utterly disregarded by Russia
and in 1802 Georgia was by military force turned
into a Russian province. There was discontent
and rebellion, but the imperial policy was carried
out in typical fashion. Arrests, persecutions, ban-
ishments followed. In time even the Georgian
Church and its funds were put in charge of the
Russian Holy Synod. The Russification of
Georgia was systematically carried on by the
Tsar's authorities. Nevertheless, Georgia pros-
pered under Russian rule. Many of its sons rose
high in the councils of the Empire, distinguishing
themselves in diplomacy, military leadership and
literature.

Georgian nationalism, however, was not sup-
pressed by the Russian policy. With the growth
of a revolutionary movement throughout Russia
there also developed one in Georgia. At first it
took a national turn only, fostered by the aristo-
cratic classes. The latter are highly educated,
and even among the common people illiteracy is
low. It has been said that proportionately the
Georgian nation has more men of letters, journal-
ists, poets and dramatists than any other race in
the world. Toward the end of the nineteenth cen-
tury Socialism began to spread in Georgia, making
remarkable headway. It aimed primarily at the
semi-feudal landlords, as well as the limited in-

GEORGIA 299

dustrial plants which had developed in Georgia
in recent years. The Socialists became a great
force in Georgia, embracing in their ranks the
peasants, workers and intellectuals.

Owing to the fact that the Georgian middle-
class is small and the aristocracy naturally in the
minority, the Socialist elements practically con-
trolled the destinies of the country during the rev-
olutionary year of 1905. The former strove for
separation from Russia, advocating complete in-
dependence for Georgia. However, the Social-
ists stood for union with democratic Russia, some
of them claiming autonomy in an all-Russian fed-
eration. All Georgians were united in their oppo-
sition to monarchism. All desired the republican
form of government. It was from the midst of
the Socialists that there sprang into being the
so-called Gurian Republic, which attracted inter-
national attention in the year of 1905. The
Gurians are described as "the bravest and most
warlike, most chivalrous, most handsome, most
hospitable, most educated, although not the most
unpractical of the Georgians." They were pro-
foundly stirred by the Socialist doctrine and de-
termined to put it into practice in their district,
Guria, in the province of Kutais. They began with
refusing to pay their annual taxes to the Russian
authorities; they proceeded to boycott the gov-
ernment officials and set up a communistic admin-
istration ; they established native schools in which

300 THE RESURRECTED NATIOKS

Socialism was taught and introduced popular
tribunals in place of the corrupt Russian courts.
The whole economic, political and social status of
the race was modeled after the latest socialistic i
theories. In the fall of 1905, when Tsarism was
baffled by the revolutionary movement, a radical
was appointed to the governorship of Kutais.
However, he was removed when the tide of re-
action followed, and even arrested and accused of
high treason. The ' ' Gurian Republic ' ' became the
target of the reactionary government. Cossacks
and infantry were sent to suppress it, causing
terrible bloodshed. It was finally wiped out and
thousands of Georgians were jailed and exiled.

The revolution of 1917 occurred almost simul-
taneously in Petrograd and the Caucasus, while
preparations had been made for a general strike.
These were not carried out because of the swift-
ness of developments in the Russian capital. The
imperial authorities in the Caucasus fell two days
after the abdication of the Tsar.

Although before the Revolution Georgian
nationalism was being encouraged by the Russian
governors for the purpose of maintaining the dif-
ferences existing among the three nationalities of
Transcaucasia, the Georgians, Tartars and Arme-
nians, March 18, 1917, saw one of the most wonder-
ful manifestations of international brotherhood
in Tiflis. All the tribes, races and classes of
Transcaucasia united in celebrating the great

GEORGIA 301

freedom, sinking all past quarrels. The Georgians,
the most advanced and civilized national elements
there, led in the formation of a Transcaucasian
federation. The councils of workmen and peasants
that sprang up everywhere, from Baku to Batum,
gave birth to a central provisional government —
the ^^Commissariat." The Georgians were the
guiding spirit of it, and they were for a union with
a federated Russian Republic. In the Provisional
Government during the Lvov-Kerensky period and
in the then moderate Soviets, several gifted
Georgians labored incessantly to stay the tide of
Bolshevism and create a democratic Russian state
founded on the principle of federation.

When the Russian Provisional Government was
overthrown by the Bolsheviki in November, 1917,
the Transcaucasian "Commissariat" decided to
strengthen the Georgian-Armenian-Tartar union
by convoking a Diet or general assembly. It met
in January, 1918, at Tiflis, and comprised about
120 members, representing all the racial groups of
Transcaucasia. However, it soon faced a crisis.
The surrender of Russia at Brest-Litovsk, by
which Turkey obtained parts of the provinces of
Batum, Kars and Ardahan, introduced the element
of dispute in the Diet. The Armenians wanted to
fight the Turks. The Tartars declared that their
ethnical and spiritual relations with the Turks
were such as to welcome them as friends. The
Georgians, while hostile to Turkish encroach-

302 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

ments, considered that the best way out was to
wait for the ending of the Great War. Some
Georgians, however, did promise the Armenians
military aid in a campaign against the Turks, but
the Armenians never received it.

The Turks then invaded Transcaucasia. The
Diet sought to conclude peace with them, but the
Ottoman command replied that it would deal only
with sovereign nations, separately or jointly. The
Diet then voted on April 27 to declare Transcau-
casian independence, against the protests of the
Armenians, Russians and several Georgians. The
Armenians thereupon left the Diet. On May 25
it declared the establishment of the independent
republics of Georgia and Azerbaijan, and the fol-
lowing day it dissolved.

But the Turks continued to press on, and the
Georgians were compelled to seek protection in
Berlin. Perhaps it was due to Germany's in-
fluence that Turkey finally consented to conclude
peace with Georgia. The Turkish-Georgian treaty
was a direct violation of the Brest-Litovsk pact.
Turkey, in addition to the territory obtained by
the latter agreement, now wrested from weak
Georgia the Achalkalaki district of the Tiflis prov-
ince.

IX
AZERBAIJAN

Azerbaijan is the name of the Tartar Republic
set up in Transcaucasia in May, 1918. It extends
along the lower part of the western Caspian coast
from the Caucasus range to the Persian province
of Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan forms a state of about
30,000 square miles, including the Russian prov-
inces of Baku, Elizavetpol and Daghestan, and
some Persian territory to the south, with a popu-
lation of more than 3,000,000.

There are several million Tartars in Russia,
scattered in the Crimea, the Volga basin, Siberia
and Transcaucasia. The Tartars of the latter ter-
ritory are the least entitled to bear that name.
They represent a mixture of races and tribes, with
Turkish blood predominating in their veins. Their
historical claims to the country they now inhabit
are as strong as Turkey's claims to Anatolia. The
Turks and Tartars occupied these regions in com-
paratively rec-ent times. The Persians have a
stronger historical claim to Azerbaijan. They
were there before Ghengiz Khan. They still have
there a considerable minority in the population.

303

304 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

Because the Transcaucasian Tartars first
invaded the Persian province of Azerbaijan and
later moved northward to their present location,
they are described as Azerbaijan Tartars, and
hence the name of their Republic. However, the
Persians point to the signs of Persian culture ex-
isting among the original inhabitants of the Tar-
tar provinces before the arrival of the Mongols,
to support their claim to control them now. Thus,
they say, Zoroaster himself was a native of Azer-
baijan; some of the leading Persian poets in the
tenth and eleventh centuries hailed from there;
while from Baku to Tabriz monuments of Persian
architecture are scattered.

The Persians ' strongest claim is, however, their
possession of the Tartar lands up to the time
Russia became interested in Transcaucasia. There
are in fact nearly two hundred thousand people
in Azerbaijan, in the province of Baku, who are
of Iranian stock. These are the Tates, who speak
a Persian dialect. But in religion they are one
with the Tartars, being Shiah Mohammedans. Be-
sides, they have identified themselves with Tartar
nationalism, adopting even the latter 's language
and traditions.

Under Persian domination the Tartars enjoyed
self-government. Their land was divided into
eight klianates. The khans owned nearly aU the
land, so that they were in effect feudal princes,
paying tribute to Persia. Turkey and Persia

AZERBAIJAN . 305

fought repeatedly over the Tartar provinces, caus-
ing terrible suffering to the Transcaucasian
Christians, the Armenians and the Georgians, who
finally appealed to Russia for help. It was in
1722 that Peter the Great sent an expedition to
conquer Baku and Derbent. Since then Russia's
penetration of Transcaucasia continued methodi-
cally and relentlessly. In 1813 the six northern
Tartar khanates definitely passed from Persia into
the possession of Russia. In 1828 Russia and
Persia again came to grips, and this time the last
two khanates of Erivan and Nakhchiva became
provinces of the Tsar's empire. The Russian con-
quest of the Tartars was accomplished largely
with the help of the Armenians, who had been op-
pressed by the khans.

"'After the Russian occupation," writes Luigi
Villari, ''this oppression ceased and some sort
of order and justice was established. Yet, al-
though deprived of political power, the khans and
begs still preserved great influence in the country,
and the Tartar peasantry looked upon them as
their hereditary chiefs, whom it was their duty
to obey. Nor were the Tartar estates touched ; on
the contrary, owing to the more settled state of
the country, they increased in value. Russian
nobility was conferred on the chiefs, who were
treated with every mark of respect, and often
given official positions in the army, the civil serv-
ice, and the local administration. But the Moslem,

306 THE RESURRECTED NATIONS

oonununity could not forget that the loss of their
predominance was largely due to the Armenians,
for which they never forgave them. . . .

'*A more serious cause of hostility is the fact
that the Tartars have all, more or less, the instinct
of brigandage. From time immemorial they have
been raiders, and to this day many villages have
no other means of livelihood than plunder. The
khans themselves, especially in the mountains, are
often little better than robber barons, who keep
hosts of armed retainers to forage them. . . .
A large number of Tartars are still nomads, and
migrate annually from the mountains to the plains
and from the plains to the mountains with their
flocks and herds. In the course of these peregri-
nations they frequently come into armed conflict
with the sedentary Armenians, and murders, out-
rages, and abduction of cattle are the result. . . .

''The Tartars are in every respect the opposite
of the Armenians. Their outward characteristics
are most sympathetic. They have a dignity of
bearing and a charm of manner which endear them
to all who come in contact with them. These qual-
ities are indeed common to most Mohammedans,
who have a chivalry and gentlemanliness which
makes us forget even serious faults, and disregard
the wrongs and sufferings which they inflict on less
attractive Christian peoples. They have been a
ruling military caste for centuries, and this has
made them an aristocracy of grands seigneurs. I

AZERBAIJAN 307

have met Tartars whom, although I knew them
to be utter scoundrels, I could not help liking.
There is something magnificently mediaeval about
them which the virtuous but bourgeois Armenian
lacks. . . .

'^The Tartars are extraordinarily backward in
their development, and as ignorant and barbarous
as any race in Asia ; for this the Russian govern-
ment is largely to blame, as it has hitherto dis-
couraged education among them, whUe they them-
selves seldom trouble to provide schools of their
own. Until quite recently no Tartar newspapers
were permitted, except one at Bakhtchi Sarai in
the Crimea, the number of mullahs, the only
teachers for a large part of the people, has been
strictly limited, and the Moslem faith placed in
a position of tutelage under an officially appointed
Sheikh-ul-Islam. ' *

In 1905 the Tsar's agents in Transcaucasia
made use of the ignorance and backwardness of
the Tartars to incite them against the Armenians.
There followed numerous massacres and feuds,
resulting in great bloodshed, which played into
the hands of the Russian authorities. However,
in October, 1905, when the revolution seemed tri-
umphant and the Caucasus was swept by the hurri-
cane of freedom, new relations were established
between the Tartars and Armenians, especially the
workers of both races in the oil region. The re-
action that followed again fostered race hatred.

308 THE RESUREECTED NATIONS

but the seeds of enlightenment sown by the Revo-
lution in October soon yielded fruit.

The Persian Revolution reverberated deeply
among the Tartars and the Turkish Revolution
stirred them even more profoundly. The Tartars
awoke to the call of civilization and nationalism.
They realized that the Russian autocracy was
their first and most dangerous enemy. The Young
Turks naturally encouraged the nationalist re-
vival among the Tartars, especially when the Pan-
Turkish, or Turanian, movement came into being
in the Ottoman Empire. In September, 1914, the
Turkish delegates who came to Erzerum to ask
Armenia's support of Turkey in the war with
Russia, indicated that the Ottoman government
planned to conquer aU Transcaucasia and set up
in its eastern part a Tartar Republic under the
suzerainty of the Porte. The Russian Revolution
of 1917, however, swung the Tartars at first to
the side of free Russia. They entered the Trans-
caucasian Diet, formed in January, 1918, with a
view to such a future orientation. But then came
Russia's collapse. Immediately the separatist
national sentiments of the Tartars, as well as of
the Georgians and Armenians, asserted them-
selves. When Turkey, the moral backer of Tartar
nationalism, invaded the Caucasus to carry out
the provisions of the Brest-Litovsk treaty, the Ar-
menians advocated resistance, the Georgians hesi-

AZERBAIJAN 309

tated, while the Tartars took a friendly stand to-
ward Turkey.

The Diet dissolved after declaring Transcau-
casian independence and the creation of the sepa-
rate sovereign Republics of Azerbaijan and
Georgia. Since May 26, 1918, therefore, there has
been in existence a Tartar state, with its capital
at Baku. The friendly relations between Azerbai-
jan and Turkey placed the rich oil wells of the
country at the disposal of the Central Powers.
The Armenians and Russians united to take pos-
session of Baku, and with the reinforcement of a
small British contingent they held the city and its
vicinity till the Tartars, reinforced by a Turkish-
German army, succeeded, in the summer of 1918,
in capturing the capital of the Azerbaijan Repub-
lic. Shortly aftei'wards, however, the British and
Armenians, upon the withdrawal of Turks and
Germans, again occupied Baku and its vicinity.

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